


Companionship Through Circuitry

by TheMockingCrows



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Blood, Canon-Typical Violence, Furbies, IV medication, M/M, Masturbation, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Radiation Sickness, Vomit, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-07
Updated: 2020-09-29
Packaged: 2020-11-27 04:38:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 28,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20942408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheMockingCrows/pseuds/TheMockingCrows
Summary: The wasteland wasn’t fit for humans, wasn’t fit for raising children in, wasn’t fit for living in comfortably unless you knew what you were doing. Luckily, Bro knows precisely what he's doing out there, though finding a back sassing artificial intelligence in a blown open bunker may be pressing the limits of that self assurance.





	1. Outset

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr link: https://themockingcrows.tumblr.com/post/188200585117

Raising a kid in the world after was a fucking challenge, but Bro had managed it in what he hoped was a decent enough way to prepare Dave for the world and all its hostilities. The war had ravaged the landscape a few hundred years ago, but the people who survived in the aftermath now had to be tough to make it in the dog eat dog world that was left behind. Maybe he'd been a bit rougher than needed, but considering how many things wanted people dead on a daily basis, it was surely for the better. The day Dave had packed up and set out for one of the bigger settlements instead of the isolated cityscape they'd spent his childhood in had been a sad day but Bro was proud of the man he’d become, and looked forward to seeing what things he’d accomplish as he made his way in the world.

Some months later he was still proud, occasionally hearing from Dave by letter, and dealing with the bittersweet sensation of suddenly being completely alone for the first time in almost twenty years. There was nobody but the radio to keep him company now. Well, the radio, a pile of puppets, some really obnoxious electronic programs he’d manufactured on his own and the massive irradiated insects that liked to try climbing the buildings along with other mutated creatures that wanted to get into his supplies. He'd kept one of the mole creatures as a pet for a while, but it hadn't worked out in the end. Captain Nibbles would forever be missed.

The persistent isolation wasn't as comforting as it was when he was younger, before Dave had been around. When he’d been on his own, wandering around and then setting up his home bit by bit out of the fallen city, it had been like a game. Now it was survival, but the kind of survival that was typical, almost boring routine. Monotonous without other humans around. It made him wonder if, perhaps, it was finally time to leave his home and go around what was left of the world, make a bit of adventure for himself and enjoy what was left of his adult life. People before the war had traveled to exotic locales far from their homes to see what life was like elsewhere, and now people post-war traveled for adventure, for riches, for supplies. The city could only hold so much after so long. The rest of the wasteland was calling, though Bro did not answer yet.

After another letter from Dave, confirmation that he'd made it to the far settlement and was not only comfortable in his new housing but getting along well with the others there and with the work he was doing, Bro finally made up his mind. Now that there was a place to reach Dave, the letters could be delivered there for a while, give him something to look forward to any time he found a settlement or a trader willing to pass along mail at the next place with a courier. He cleaned out the apartment of debris and locked up the supplies he was leaving behind behind some self patented boobytraps before packing up the remainder onto his back. He was traveling fairly light, already knowing the general area well enough as far as animals went and how to make use of different creatures and plants without getting sick.. not to even mention how much else was probably untouched this far out. The further from civilization, the fewer humans wanted to travel save for those like himself who’d just keep moving. Maybe he’d wind up finding some big pre-war cache of goodies to come home with, expand his setup to some of the other buildings, link them all like they were in the old days.

Hey, a man could dream.

This would be easy. So what if it'd been years, he had this shit on lockdown. He'd done it when he was younger and he could do it now. He hadn't lost his polish in the goddamn slightest, and this expedition was just going to prove that. Checking the sun after leaving the building that had been home for so long, he decided to walk North, leaving the Eastern and Western settlements in his long gaited dust.

It was not easy, but the masochist in Bro liked it better this way. Oh there was enough to eat and he wasn't dehydrated, but there wasn't much peace to be had at first. For some reason the further North he went, the more robotics he found. Rogue creations built to last before the war were guarding different locations that would make perfect sleeping or scrapping sites, hiding whatever secrets lay within with lasers that he didn't feel like tangling with. 

There were also more wanderers than he'd anticipated, which was where the masochism kicked in. Plenty of opportunities to bust someone's face up for trying to fuck with him and his belongings, chances to get some aggression and energy out taking someone off the face of what was left of the Earth before anyone else could do the same to him first. It was kill or be killed out here, and it made him feel comforted in how he'd raised Dave. Even settlements could be raided or attacked, and if he could handle himself out here then his kid could handle himself in an emergency too.

The only down side of the scuffles was how much blood was usually involved, both from others and occasionally his own. Well aimed strikes and slices made for easy enough cleaning of his blade to keep rust away but it usually wound up with spray to the face or the clothes. Not many people would want to trade with someone who looked like he'd walked through Hell, but then again if they'd set foot up here too.. maybe they'd understand and take a bit of pity on an older guy who decided traveling the world alone was the best option to take as a newfound empty nester.

On second thought, perhaps there were two down sides. He'd prepared for injuries, but he hadn't prepared for this many this early. Cuts of a certain depth needed to be disinfected and stitched, bandaged to protect them from the elements since he was stuck sleeping a bit rough. Bro had stitch supplies aplenty and the stomach to do his own without much flinching, but bandages were another issue entirely. He couldn't resort to using clothing as bandages yet, not unless there was a true emergency due to the contamination risks, but the urgency was high enough that he started being less picky about the directions he chose to walk each day in hopes he’d find some replacement material to restock his supplies with.

Fuck it, get lost on purpose, he'd find his way eventually either home or to Dave or to someone who knew where other landmarks were to get him started on an actual path. Strider homes were where they fucking made them, not in specific locales, even if those locales had been pretty damn cushy as far as post apocalyptica was considered. If he wandered far enough there'd be a trader or a spare campsite that wouldn't shoot at him immediately or even an empty house that wasn't picked too cleanly of things like bedsheets. There always was. Humans before the war had spread far and wide, and everywhere that didn’t seem like a house wound fit inevitably had at least one or two sites set up and a rusted out car beside it or somewhere in the overgrown mass that had once been a yard.

Luck finally came, or at least he hoped it was luck, in the form of what looked from a distance like a blasted open bunker site. Something built into the side of a cliff that had long since been torn asunder, partially left open to the elements. No doubt there'd be some things living inside, maybe even people, but that didn't look like it had originally been public property. Private property, especially old government property, usually had some useful shit lying around if you knew where and how to look.

Bro didn't want to toot his own horn, but one of the reasons they'd been so cushy at home had been specifically because of his hard earned prowess with electronics and old computers. It made security easier, made traps more effective, and made finding the occasional goodies in the city ruins that made up their back yard easier. Big fully armed bots? No, not face to face could he fuck with those, he had a bit of sense in his head. But someone's computer at a formerly benign desk inside, if there was any kind of reserve power or a way to hook up reserve power? Oh, yes. Those things could be dropped like flies and whatever they were guarding could be his.

Just.. needed to hope others hadn't been there before him and done all that already. Or that they weren't super thorough in their picking through things. Raiders wouldn’t give two shits about the electronics, and scrap traders would just be after easily accessible metal and food and odds and ends rather than higher risk or higher energy items. 

He prayed for lazy scrap traders to have been there instead of anyone else.

The place had certainly been broken into before, vandalized more than once judging by the layers of graffiti on the walls and the garbage strewn about, the vague scent of old urine and feces from some hall or another that he didn’t plan to go down.. and otherwise left in tact in a lot of ways. The buildings location was sturdy enough that whatever blasts had rocked it during the war didn't destroy it entirely or drop floors into one another. Storage areas were picked absolutely clean to the surprise of nobody, but a lot of the desks weren't touched in the office sections Bro checked. When he tried to check computers, a few of them still weakly glowed and flickered to life before growing stronger behind the layer of dust and grime, the plugs securely holding onto generators that were more than meant to withstand time.

Old messages from people long since dead, most of them useless but interesting all the same, greeted him. Talk of office gossip and happenings, disciplinary meetings. Nothing of interest till he'd nearly given up. 

AR. That's the base of what the project was supposedly called, some kind of artificial intelligence meant to become the brain of a new wave of bots that was still being tested. Bro's fingers itched with interest as he scrolled downwards, revealing more of the information in the file he’d found. The capabilities of this thing were supposed to be vast, but it never went into production before the bombs fell, and the tests were supposed to be taking place on one of the lower levels, with the finished product planning to be sent further North to be united with a prototype body.

After double checking which floor, Bro decided to go ahead and check it out. Couldn't hurt. Hell, if this AI, or AR, was as intelligent as he was being led to believe then maybe it'd at least be someone to talk to once he could find a voice box for the thing. AI's were hit or miss though, especially pre-war ones that was supposedly the Next Big Thing. Risky. ...But fuck the curiosity was strong, and since he wanted to look around anyway, why not? Maybe there'd be some supplies he could snag from down there if nothing else. Another reason to look around had been found.

This area too had been picked pretty clean, much to Bro’s dismay, until he reached a set of doors that bore the same types of screens as the office computers, with them each asking for prompts and passwords, for proof of identity, for clearance to access the room they were standing guard in front of. Other versions of these doors had long since been deactivated or never activated in the first place, damaged and hulking open like a gaping maw for him to wander through to get down here at all.

Annoying. Not impossible, but annoying. Bro had to actually take his bag off and rummage through it for some tools to pry the front off of the screens input sections, using clips and his fingers to carefully compress different portions of circuit boards inside till he finally set off a controlled spark. The screens remained lit, still asking for their password, but the doors mechanisms had lost power. All it took was a solid pry and.. 

"Bingo,” he said, smirking to himself and licking a sore spot on his thumb from the earlier circuit fuckery before pulling his bag on, whistling, and sauntering on inside.

Untouched except by traces of dust, what looked like a basic lab setup lay beyond the doors Bro had pried open, with all the supplies left behind and functional lighting. The bombs had fallen during the day, it explained why there were some skeletons in here, better preserved than out in the more open areas, but it didn’t bother him. This was just how life was: the living rummaging amongst the dead, trying to find use and sense in what was left behind as best they could. He dug in with both hands after side stepping the remains, a kid in a candy store of untainted pre-war technology.

Some new tools? Why, certainly. Circuitry paste? Christmas came early. Solder? Yes, please. He managed to find an old first aid station and raided the bandages and bandaids, as well as an old snack cabinet which mostly wound up inside his backpack once he'd crammed it into place. A bottle of rubbing alcohol also joined the rest of the things, though other chemicals and cleaning agents were left behind. Saline seemed appealing for a quick wash.. But again, maybe later. There were more important things to do right now, and now that the doors were open it wasn’t safe forever. He was on a timer, even if it was self imposed, for his own safety.

Now... where was that AI at. Bro trailed his fingertips along the counters as he stalked different stations, trying to guess where it would be stored. Would it be in the system still? Would he need to download it and jury rig something to put the fucker into? Would it even fit into a standard download? He didn't exactly have a plethora of supplies to work with, just whatever happened to be around.. and then he'd spotted it.

What looked like a strange pair of sunglasses, sharp winged and shimmering black, rested on the rubber face of a test dummy with wide glass eyes behind a simple plexiglass stand shield. Slim wires and cords ran to the sides of the arms of the shades, reaching back towards one of the larger computers in the room, giving Bro an idea of where to go to next with his fuckery, though his touch was more delicate now. At least with these bigger systems they could be negotiated with an- 

Oh. No need. The last user, likely one of the unlucky souls in the room, had left the access point logged in instead of working on a logout timer. Christmas AND his birthday had come early when Bro saw the words  **AR: Auto-Responder, Artificial Intelligence Unit** emblazoned at the top of the screen. The name Dirk Strider rested below it as the creator, making Bro doubletake for a moment. ...Huh. Weird name, but seeing a pre-war Strider was entertaining. Wait till he told Dave he might have found some ancestor who was as big of a nerd as he was with this shit.

A bit more clicking around and Bro had a sense of how they were meant to work, or sense enough that he decided to go ahead and disconnect the cables gently before lifting the shades up to put them on his own face. The testing phases had gone well apparently, and while this was just one of the forms they'd tested the AI for aside from the eventual body, it was one of the most effective formats available. There was hope that, with some tinkering, he’d be able to transfer the AI to another item in the future.

He just kind of wished the current shape wasn't so...

"God these're stupid lookin' .."

** Welcome new user. Please indicate a name.**

Oh.

"Ambrose," he said aloud, eyes flicking around to try tracking on the target that kept moving, aligning to his pupils and honing in on the accuracy.

** Name is stupid. Please indicate another name.**

..The fuck.

"Ambrose," he said again. 

** Name still stupid. Please indicate another name.**

"I don't know what to tell ya, that's my name," he insisted.

** I don't know what to tell you either, your name is unfortunate.**

Great. It was a very realistic, sassy AI. It felt like arguing with a teenager. A really annoying teenager.

"Either accept my name is Ambrose or tell me what you will accept as a user name," Bro said. "What about Bro. Will Bro work?"

There was a soft chime sound as the eye tracking finally finished honing in and the application started to work, zooming in on different things when he squinted and pulling back when he widened his eyes enough, the soft ghost of the letter t following both of his eyes like a target. 

** Ambrose still sucks. Bro can be worked with. Welcome, Bro.**

"You worked with a guy named Dirk but you won't work for another Strider. Pfft. Typical. You'd prolly work for Dave easy as pie."

** Dirk?** the voice said.

For a split second Bro swore he was staring into a pair of eyes instead of the vague traces of target t's in front of his eyes, red as Dave's with dark sclera that made them pop bright as glowing rubies. Then, just as fast, they were gone from sight and all that remained was the glow of the lights overhead and the dusty lab equipment.

"...The fuck."

** Dirk??** the voice said again, sounding confused this time.

"Yeah, your file said Dirk Strider was your original creator?" Bro said. "My name's Ambrose Strider. Small world, huh. Gettin' smaller all the goddamn time too since the war."

The targets disappeared and were replaced by what looked like loading signals, a small bar off to the side fluctuating and flashing numbers as it searched for something in its files. Another flicker as it checked for a signal repeatedly, then came back to the t format in front of his eyes.

** The war has happened then.**

"Yeah."

** You are not Dirk.**

"Pretty obviously not."

Another pause.  **I thought...**

"Thought what."

** Your eyes are nearly identical to my creators. Different though. Older.**

"So he was young then, huh?" Bro asked, grabbing a few of the cords that had worked for charging the unit and hooking it up to things in case they came in handy later on. Then, just as leisurely as he'd entered the lab, he left with his newfound prize on his face to scavenge the rest of the building. There hadn’t been much in the main rooms, and he knew to avoid anywhere that smelled like waste, but another quick look through the offices couldn’t hurt.

** Yes, quite young. The last time I saw him directly he was about to turn twenty five. He created me when he was much younger though. Thirteen.**

Bro whistled, impressed, and continued to listen to the voice that spoke just in front of his ears as he explained some of the process his creator had used to make him in the first place as a child. This was nice actually. The voice was human enough that it was comforting, had personality. He wondered if this was what that Dirk guy had sounded like, or if they'd picked a random voice box for the testing periods. He didn't feel alone, but he also didn't have that overpowering sense of urgency to keep someone protected at the same time. It was soothing.

He didn't feel alone anymore OR as stressed as he would have been.

When the entire area had been combed as finely as he cared to look, Bro decided to call it good enough and prepared to leave the building the same way he’d come. Night would be coming eventually, and putting some distance between himself and here would be a good plan for sleeping. AR stopped him however, blaring a short burst of sound in warning that made Bro wince and reach his hands up to clap them over his ears.

** I'm not permitted to leave the premises. You are not authorized to remove me from the building.**

"Look. I'd love to get authorization but the skeleton whose thumbprint I'd need is prolly dust by now. You're comin' with me, alright? Keep cool."

** You're an idiot.**

"And you're a pair of fugly lookin' sunglasses," Bro snapped back immediately, rubbing his ears with his thumbs to get rid of the ringing sensation.

** You're the one wearing me, what does that say about you then. Where are you even taking me.**

"Outside. I'm goin' a bit further North I think.. Your files said you had a body prototype, yeah?" he asked, remaining inside to make certain that he wasn’t about to get another surprise earful from this thing.

** Dirk was working on creating a body for me, yes. There was going to be mass production eventually.**

Not for something with this much personality, Bro thought. Nothing this smart would be allowed to fight or function untethered. Maybe a lobotomized version was going to be mass produced, or whatever wrinkles ran this thing were going to be steamed out.. but if he could find the main prototype..? The concept of an android with this much intelligence being with him as a companion was appealing. Sturdier than a human, could care for itself, didn’t need to eat or drink, and would run with the maintenance he already knew how to give or could figure out how to give.

Sounded like a perfect travel buddy, once he got past the wiseass attitude it had.

"Wanna come with me to find your body then?" Bro asked. "If it's still there it's prolly on a king’s ransom worth of electronics, I'd be sittin' pretty for years." New house, new setup, get to build his own shit more often, maybe rig up some nice solar again, make a computer to send to Dave, ge-

** Why are you doing this.**

"Why does anyone do anything?"

There was silence again, another loading screen, before the chime sound happened again, soft and accepting.

** I don't feel like discussing philosophy right now. But I would appreciate not being glasses anymore.**

Bro left the building behind without much thought. It wasn't a home, it wasn't a base. It was special in its own way though. For the time being, it had given him something to do. A goal. It had given him some hope, new projects. For the first time in a long while Bro felt excited again about something, something that only he was doing, something for himself. Something only he could do, now that AR was currently living on his face at least. Wandering the wasteland was all well and good, but this was a step up in the right direction.

The wasteland wasn’t fit for humans, wasn’t fit for raising children in, wasn’t fit for living in comfortably unless you knew what you were doing.. But now he had to be grateful to it. It had given him a friend, even if that friend was a bit annoying so far.

All in all? Not that bad of a scavenging expedition. Bro ranked it a solid 5/5 hats, would probably ransack again.


	2. Radiation Blues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not everywhere is safe to sleep, and warnings shouldn't be ignored. Even if they come from pretentious sounding AI.

** What are you doing.**

"I'm writin' to my kid, mind your own business."

** My God in Heaven save us all, you've procreated.**

"Yeah, and my spawn's the raddest thing in the world, what about it. Mind your own business, I'm already smudgin' the shit out of this," Bro muttered, writing against his thigh on layered paper carefully as he could. Being a lefty was suffering sometimes, even if he tried his damndest to write neatly.

There were probably better ways to go about doing this, better times or places, but something about camp that night felt safe and secure, and it was about time for another letter to get written and sent out to check in and let him know what was up. So there he sat by his fire curled up with the paper on his thigh, detailing to Dave what he’d been up to and the newfound.. Friend? Follower? Companion? 

The new sunglasses he got that happened to be sarcastic as shit.

** If you don't want me to be observing, you should do something sensible. Like take me off your fucking face.**

"That'd be too easy. Be a good little bot and hush now."

** I am an AI, not a 'good little bot'. Don't be condescending to me.**

"I'm sorry I hurt all two of your pre-programmed feelings but seriously, shut your trap for a second and let me write or I'll forget some shit," Bro complained, "I'm leavin' you on because I don't wanna wind up entirely blind to the dark outside the lit up area."

Sleeping would be good tonight. Not only was it safe enough for a little bit of fire by his judgement and with plenty of air to avoid problems from smoke, but there was more than enough room to stretch out and relax. He wouldn't be crammed into a corner or sleeping sitting up tonight, oh no. He'd be fully fed, warm, comfortably dry and sprawled out on a bedroll like he owned the damn place. Buildings without roofs were pretty rad sometimes, bless concrete and brick, bless the steel beams that supported the tall bitches, they made his heart beat.

** I should probably warn you since you’re insisting on staying: you are exposed here.**

"You said that earlier and I’m tellin’ you: I'm not that exposed. You've been out here what, a day? And tested pre-war. I've been out here forty odd years, let the master take a load off. I'll sleep well tonight'n clear out by dawn. The stairs are shitty and I took my board with me. There's fire between the stairs'n me, I can tuck duck'n roll if I gotta beat feet out the window to the dumpster.. Shit's fine."

** That is not what I meant. I'm saying you're exposed to a lot of things here.**

"Yeah, we've established that you're wron- ah motherfuck look what you made me do," he sighed, pen leaving a blob of ink in the center of a word he’d paused too long on. Shoddily made hunk of junk. Modern pens could never hold a candle to the sturdy as hell pre-war ones with their pressurized, ever ready gel ink.

** Your health is at risk.**

Bro let out a steady breath from his nose in irritation, finished writing his sentence by crooking his hand in an awkward claw to avoid the wet spot, and then fanned the paper in the air to dry the ink splotch faster so it wouldn't transfer between pages and locations when he folded it for sending later. Or adding on to, if anything interesting happened between now and the next time he saw someone willing to courier or pass along to a courier for him and a normal delivery fee.

"My health is absolutely fine. I get you’re pre-war and used to the regulations’n shit they required but this is different. ..Look, if you're that concerned just wake me up before bad shit happens to me. You don't need sleep, do you? Just a charge when your inner batteries get low or the onboard rechargin' system gets borked, the rest of the time you're doin' your own thing," Bro guessed. "Just siren me awake before I get nibbled on if you're so concerned about my bein' asleep up here. I'm a light sleeper."

The target t's in front of his eyes turned in a slow loading circle several times before he heard the confirmation chime once again near his ear.

** Duly noted. Enjoy writing to your spawn, Bro.**

"Was that so hard?" he asked, blowing on the ink for another moment before touching the splotch with a fingertip and finding it dry. Carefully he folded the letter up and tucked it into his bag with the traitor pen in its security cap beside it, then settled down on his sleeping roll with a heady sigh. Finally: off his feet, fully stretched out.. It'd be better to be on a mattress, he'd taken that for granted over the years, but hey this was still pretty sweet. Soft enough to relax on.. soft enough to sleep on.. 

His eyes grew heavy as he watched the fire crackle and pop now and then, hands folded over his pleasantly full stomach. Within minutes he was out cold, softly snoring with the glasses perched on his face and AR finally quiet. The unnaturally clear sky stretched out overhead and the ever moving wasteland felt like it stood still peacefully for once, just for a little while.

\- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Ambrose could hear a sharp, electronic whine as if it were coming from under water. No matter how far or how close he got to it the whine stayed the same pitch, annoying and gnat like. There didn’t seem to be any escape, no way to silence it, not even any way to interact with it since he couldn’t lay eyes on it. Whatever it was pulsed a few times before going louder, making his ears ache and his head feel like it wanted to split. He was sure of one thing: once he got his hands on whatever was making that god awful sound, he was going to put his sword through it and beat it into the dirt till it rested in a million tiny pieces.

He grimaced and finally opened his eyes, staring up at the dark sky of pre-dawn, flickers of unchanging stars and the distant glimmer of what was probably either space junk giving up the ghost and crashing somewhere into the atmosphere or a run of the mill shooting star. This was a beautiful way to wake up aside from the sound pulsing in front of his ears from AR who promptly shut it off as soon as he was conscious, giving him a moment of head pounding reprieve to be more conscious. It was earlier than he wanted to be awake. Ambrose could feel his joints protesting movement and his skin.. itching. Wincing, Bro sat slowly upright and felt his world swimming around him sickeningly, face flushed and frigid at the same time. Everything had a fisheye lens quality to it that he wasn't enjoying in the slightest, and with a failed attempt at standing landing him on his knees again he crawled hurriedly to a corner far from his bedding to empty his stomach out onto the concrete.

Farewell fine dinner, you will be missed. At least it'd been there a few hours, so it wasn't a total waste of calories.

** Ah, you're finally up.**

"The fuck is hap-  _ hrrk _ ," he got out before another heave took him over, leaving his shoulders around his ears and cold sweat racing down his clammy spine.

** I told you: you're exposed here and your health is at risk, ** AR repeated as if speaking to a particularly slow child.

Groaning, Bro rubbed at his mouth with the back of his forearm and slowly crawled back to his bedding and backpack to try making himself pack. The area was bad, he had to leave no matter how shitty he felt. "Yeah, mind clarifying why I feel like dogshit all at once?"

** Radiation sickness is, as they say, a bitch like that. I'd recommend leaving the area promptly as you can to reduce increasing symptoms, and to obtain treatment at the nearest facility you can reach.**

The nearest facility, he says. The nearest facility.

"What part of  _ THE FUCKING BOMBS FELL LIKE TWO HUNDRED YEARS AGO  _ don't you understand?" Bro complained, gritting his teeth and hurriedly packing. This was going to be a bitch to walk through later, he could already feel it. "I've got some meds but they're not instant.. ugh, don't you think you could've clarified that I was nappin' in a contaminated spot?"

** If you'll recall I did. Repeatedly.**

"Sayin' my health's at risk and that I'm exposed are two different fuckin' things, and nowhere did you say radiation," growled Ambrose as he shouldered his bag and grabbed his board, heading for the stairs. Away from the light he prepared to lift the shades to his forehead, only to realize the view had changed to something akin to night vision. It wasn't crisp as a cat, but it sure as fuck was an improvement on normal vision, and twice as much on sick vision. 

..Okay, so maybe he wouldn't chuck this bitch into the trash after all.

** Typically humans take warnings about their health and safety more seriously than 'Yeah, hold my beer'.**

"Let's clarify then: if I'm about to get shanked, shot, eaten, beaten, fricasseed or FUCKING IRRADIATED to a level that’d make me sick... you tell me which it is and I'll act accordingly," Ambrose reasoned. "Also, shit, thanks for changin' the vision over. Why didn't you say you could do this earlier?"

** You never asked, nor do I assume you read my user manual, as last I was aware there was not one in production.**

Ambrose made it downstairs and outside before he dry heaved once again into the dirt. He took a moment afterwards to clear his sinuses, hock and spit for distance to get rid of the scent of vomit from his nose. It was an improvement to be able to breathe again, but he couldn’t pause to rinse his mouth just yet. Fuck he’d kill for some mouthrinse, or some alcohol to wash the taste out of his mouth..

No time to lament, it was time to focus and get moving again. Right. North. He was going North. Which way was North.. Ambrose craned his head back to watch the sky before looking towards the hints of dawn in the distance and adjusting his pathing accordingly.

"Y'know, I bet you've prolly got all kinds of maps and shit available to you," he said, "but I wish you had current maps. A lot of places just straight up don't exist or matter anymore compared to what mattered pre-war. ...And also, let me know when we're free of the contamination zone."

** I am capable of adjusting my saved maps if required. Simply show me an adjusted one and I can save the data, or I can alter an existing copy. Also, you're lucky you look like Dirk. I don't believe I'd be willing to help anyone else who spoke to me half as carelessly and crudely as you do.**

"Unless I had cheat codes I bet. What, havin' wet robo dreams about your creator or somethin'?"

** It's not like that in the slightest, ** AR insisted in the same stoic monotone as usual, though somewhere in there Ambrose swore up and down he could detect a trace of something more.

"If I wake up with condensation all over you at some point I'm gonna just assume you were focusing too hard on this Dirk guy whose eyes I've got," Ambrose said. "What's robo jizz when you're an AI. Solder? Joint grease? Lubricant of some kind?"

** I take back my previous warnings. The area we have left is perfectly clear of radiation. A good long nap is in order in the very clear safe area you were last camping in.**

Bro smirked in amusement at the fact he was able to get beneath the skin of something that didn't even have skin to begin with. There was no reason to hold back on this thing. Yes there were feelings, but it wasn't quite the same as heckling Dave. Not the same at all.

This thing gave as good as it got and held no punches, not even when his life had been on the line. Something that could talk shit when he was at risk of dying while also helping him was kind of refreshing.

He kept walking till AR gave the all clear, then slowly took his bag off and sank down to sit in a clear area near some rocks, back against the unyielding surface to keep propped up as he rummaged out a container of pills and a container of water. Unable to really trust the water much anymore after the time it had spent in the contamination zone with him, but having no other options currently, Ambrose took a dose of medication with a few swigs.. before shrugging and draining the rest of the container. Being dehydrated was just as dangerous as what he was trying to cure and would kill him even faster to boot. Low grade radiation was no laughing matter, but damage and weakness from dehydration would just make death inevitable. Putting the pills and the empty container back into his bag, Ambrose sighed and closed his eyes for a few minutes, wanting it all to hit his stomach and settle instead of just coming back up immediately in a waste. AR had his back, and every time he opened his eyes he could see sharp outlines in the green wash of night vision. He did not envy future him in the slightest.. and made a mental note to scavenge bathrooms at the nearest opportunity to re-stock on toilet paper before it became a hot commodity.

  
  


\- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

  
  


By the afternoon, Ambrose was still sick but far more mobile. Not in top fighting condition, but mobile. AR had, on his own volition, taken the request from earlier to heart and was keeping an eye out on the surroundings even in directions Ambrose wasn't currently focusing on. His peripheral vision had never been sharper than when a soft, steady voice alerted him to movement from one direction or another to avoid run ins with unwanted animals or people who held no good intentions for him. He kept his grip tight on his sword and used it when absolutely necessary, such as when a hungry wild dog caught scent of him and came in for the kill, but otherwise skirted around even the odd herd animal in case it turned violent. There just wasn’t energy to spare when every step felt like he was running in place.

It was a strange symbiotic relationship, but Bro was content with it for now. The best part of this was that voice didn't sound worried. It was comforting to not have emotion tied into it, letting him pick and choose his reactions at a better pace than feeding into potentially misplaced concerns. No frantic cries or stress, no aggression, not even suggestion in the tone. Just flat, simple alerts telling him which way to turn his head to make his own choices.

The sight of more and more people all filtering the same direction off in the horizon gave Bro a strong sense of relief as night came on. There was a glow in the distance as well, lights and flickery power and people and opportunities to rest and trade safely. Well. Safely as it could get out here anyway. From the shake in his legs and the nausea he was still feeling, the fever, this was a bit of a miracle in itself that he’d stumbled upon a populated trade area. Surely there was a doctor tucked away in there making a killing worth of profit from the locals and the unwary like himself that drifted in.

What had once been a strip mall complex had been reborn as a shopping center for everything from weaponry to clothing to farming supplies, and a nearby apartment block was divvied up to serve as a hotel. The cheapest rooms were the ones shared with multiple people and the cots all in one cramped space, while the more expensive guaranteed privacy of all facilities. Cheap but not that cheap, Bro opted for a room that could be split with another two people instead of several, and lucked out that at the time the amount of people were low and he had privacy for a while. Maybe he should have gone cheaper and shared with others.. But the thought of sharing a bathroom with six people while this sick was unpleasant.

Depositing his baggage beneath the cot he'd rented, he hauled his happy carcass to find the physician and got some extra treatment by way of a quick injection and a good dose of Prussian blue for good measure once he paid the fee. The doctor was used to this kind of thing, and said he should count himself lucky it wasn’t a higher dose that hit his organs. Blood transfusions were hit or miss outside of vaults or areas with more old tech to keep running. He purchased a few more items to take with him just in case of more issues, some more bandages as well, and then wished the physician farewell. After a bit more shopping, a shower and a change of clothes were also a godsend, though he was displeased with how little the collar of the new shirt could be popped compared to the old stained one he was ditching. 

Oh well. Sacrifices must be made sometimes even for the suffering. He’d find a decent shirt somewhere else surely, somewhere with some proper abuse of starch.

AR was alternately chatty and silent, observing how society functioned now, from the money to the layout of the buildings and repurposing of property. It  _ wasn't _ just an Ambrose thing then. The building codes were just chucked out the window entirely and everyone made the best of what they had or what they could get apparently. Even the fashion was different. It was a lot to take in and process, but every curious AR was taking careful notes and using his self teaching abilities to learn all that he could through observation. Ambrose answered every single one of his questions which was surprising but welcome, and he caught himself wondering if it was because he’d raised a child before that the constant barrage of ‘how, why, when, where, why, why,  _ why _ ’ didn’t drive him immediately up the wall.

Maybe the spawn was a boon instead of an unfortunate.

Dinner was courtesy of the strip mall, a restaurant near the end having a nice cozy atmosphere and plenty of good smelling smoke coming from its cracked open front door. The interior seemed to have been a restaurant pre-war as well, though many modifications had been done since to allow for the new dining options. Bro splurged on a double pattied burger with what was supposed to be cheese and sauce and even sprouts on top, easy to grow and even easier to not cook wrong. He got a serving of homemade pickles to put some of the salt back in his body from the sickness earlier, and even some pre-war dessert in a tightly sealed package. It had been Dave’s absolute favorite, an apple treat, and maybe it was the sentimental side of him acting up but he was sure it’d taste even sweeter than he remembered now that it’d been a while since experiencing it.

** Bro. Are you certain your belongings are safe where you left them? It seems rather dog eat dog out here, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone robbed you blind.**

"They saw what bag I was carryin' when I came in, and what room I'm in. Beyond that.. just gotta hope people're decent," he shrugged, feeding his hunger while he actually had it. He might still feel like he had the flu, but facts were facts: sometimes a guy just needed to stuff his face with greasy food to feel a bit more human. 

** I suppose there must be laws or rules in different settlements,** AR mused.  **Recreations of what once was.**

"Yeah, there's rules,” Bro said, counting off on his fingers as he talked with his mouth half full. “Don't be a douchebag, don't get caught bein' a douchebag, and if you start shit you get hit with deadly force because nobody's got time for even more bullshit than we've already gotta deal with." He licked his thumb free of some pickle juice as he finished listing things off, then dove in for some more. Sweet electrolytes take him home.

** Don't forget to send your letter.**

Startled that he’d nearly forgotten, Bro straightened up and glanced to the door to gauge how late it must be before turning back to his plate to finish his serving of food off. On a spur of the moment, swooning from the food, he caught the owner’s attention and got a sweet cola as well. The attempts at making fresh never tasted quite the same as the pre-war stock, and it was worth the extra bit of payment to ensure the bubbles were all his.

"Shit, you're right. Bit too late to do it right now, but the mornin' I should be able to find someone. This place is permanent it seems like, there'll be traders back and forth no doubt," he said. "Good call AR."

** Hal.**

"Come again?" Bro asked, confused.

Bro's vision flickered briefly as the letters  **H A L** crossed his vision, followed by the same strange pair of red eyes with dark sclera he'd seen before. It lasted just a few seconds before fading out of sight, leaving him with the usual target t's of the shades instead.

** My name. It’s Hal.**

"Isn't your name AR?"

** That is another sort of name, yes. But I would prefer if you called me Hal.**

"...It's what Dirk called you, isn't it," Ambrose guessed.

** Yes. But I would still prefer to have a name than an acronym.**

Bro used one gloved, rough hand to twist off the cap from the bottle of soda and take a swig. It was sweet enough it made his teeth hurt a bit. Perfect end to a greasy, rich meal. His upset stomach would thank him for it later surely, but he was prepared for it now.

"Alright then. Hal. I can do that."

** Thank yo-**

"Soon as you admit my name isn't stupid."

The targets disappeared and the turning circles reappeared for a time like a holding signal.

** Request does not compute. Name too unfortunate to register over acceptable name of Bro for user. Unable to re-register user,** he said, accompanied by the saddest excuse for a failure tune Bro had ever heard in 8bit melody.

He sighed.

"Fine, fine. God damn you're a prick for a guy without a prick, Hal."

** I've no doubt that will be rectified once we find my body. Keep your commentary in line with that thought as if it were already reality moving forward.**

"Give an inch take a mile. Alright, duly noted. ...Wait, why the fuck would a government made AI need a fuckin' di-"

** My creator was all about authenticity.**

"...Right."

** It's true.**

"This is my rifle, this is my gun, this one's for shootin' this one's for fun," Ambrose sighed, tipping his bottle back to swig the rest of the drink down before casually belching the rush of bubbles back out. Phew. Better. Goodbye nausea, hello sweet relief.

** I've no idea what you are referring to.**

"Keep takin' notes, Hal, you'll catch up eventually to everything that Dirk didn't program into you. That's all the fun shit anyway, people always forget the real fun shit." 


	3. Uploading

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not all uploads are created equal.

** Upload me, Bro.**

“Don’t you need a stronger interface than that? Would you even work with that thing?”

** I was designed to functionally overwrite data when necessary, and if that means re-writing the code of a simple wrecker then so be it. Upload me.**

Bro sighed a bit. He had his reservations now that he was starting to get used to Hal’s voice and attitude, and the concept of potentially losing him because he didn’t want to take a lengthy detour was kind of obnoxious. But hey, what did he know, he was just a post-war guy taking directions from an AI who seemed to know his own capabilities far better. Against his better judgement, Bro took the shades off of his face and fished out the connection cable, following Hal’s advice to locate where an entry port could be positioned based on the make and model of the machinery at hand.

The massive structure was meant to replace cranes for more basic movements, the continuous track treads far superior to wheels and the mobility vastly improved. The behemoth whirred to life a few moments after Ambrose finished the upload cycle, glasses still gently dangling by their cord till he ducked forward and tucked them somewhere less conspicuous. The droid moved its appendages, orienting itself as Hal took control and sussed out the operational maneuvers for each piece. It was a strangely human motion, the sensors of the face looking down at the pincer hands before giving them a whirl and twirl, clicking them together a few times to gauge the pressure.

** _ Right. Step back._ **

Thank fuck this was temporary. Hearing the modulation of Hal’s voice was jarring, booming and decidedly electric from the audio core even with its damage and residue. When he stood fully upright, many times taller than Ambrose, it was with the soft screech of abused metal and rust. This wasn’t going to last forever, but it should last long enough to move a few barriers out of the way. Hal whirred forward excitedly and clasped both pincers into the edge of a stacked vehicle long since crashed, tugging it a few times before the body gave way to motion and the entire pile began to move. Ambrose wasn’t certain what all would be beyond where they could see, but he had a feeling that getting through the blockade would open up some options.

Or, you know, trap him underground to die a horrible death. But who’s keeping track of anything, right?

With much whirring and churning metal, Hal eventually moved several wrecked cars that had acted as a barricade between them and the rest of the bridge that seemed sturdy enough to cross as far as he could see. So the asphalt was gone in a few places, the girders and skeletal aspects of the bridge were still plenty intact for a man and a pair of sunglasses to pass unhindered so long as they didn’t gain too much attention. Or at least got away from the ruckus of attention they were currently causing right now.

** _ I changed my mind, can I stay in this longer?_ **

“No. You cleared the junk and I can cross now, get back in the glasses so we can leave,” Bro said, already sensing where this was going.

** _ What if there’s more junk on the other side of the bridge? Or in the center? Wouldn’t it be handy to have someone who would be able to move it easier? _ ** Hal asked, giving his hands another whirr for emphasis as if Bro could have somehow forgotten the difference between a set of pointed shades as a fully fledged wrecker droid.

“I said no. How much power does that thing have left anyways?”

** _ Enough to enjoy getting over the bridge in style._ **

“And if I don’t feel like travelin’ with a gigantic fuckin’ target on my back?” Bro asked. “What then, hm? Everything in a mile prolly heard all this noise, you’re not exactly dainty with your maneuverin’.”

** _ I believe you’d benefit more from me in this shape for a while. I’m enjoying having hands, that’s a bonus. And being able to move where I want to_ ** , Hal said as he backed up and did a quick turn as he could on the tracks.  ** _I could serve as a shield if required, or lift things to be a shield for you._ **

Bro ran his tongue over his teeth. The offer DID sound kind of appealing when put like that… but he knew it’d bite him in the ass just as soon, knowing his luck. He shook his head and went over towards the shades, tapping them with his fingers.

“Nope. In you go.”

** _ But what if I just followed along behind you._ **

“And if we get separated how’m I supposed to get to your body then, huh? Want me to get there on my own, without you, and put somethin’ stupid in there?” Ambrose asked with a smirk. “The best body they could have created for you, the body your creator dude wanted for you, all goin’ to waste so I have someone to play Pong with.”

Hal was silent for a moment before the massive droid looked down with a creak of metal. He could practically hear him squinting.

** _ You wouldn’t dare._ **

“Spoken like someone who doesn’t know me very well,” Ambrose said with a shrug, both hands lifted up for emphasis at how helpless he was in the situation overall. “You think I wouldn’t kill to have a good quality droid be my butler and play stupid games with me? Dude, my kid left for the city already, who’s gonna fill the void for me now if not that or a bitchy AI.”

The droid looked towards the bridge again, sensors trying to run how he’d normally run to assess risks before realizing the hardware just wasn’t up to spec to do what he wanted to do. This body was made for moving things, for lifting and toting, for sorting, not for detecting stealth routes a companion could take to an objective. Ever so slowly the droid bowed down and let its arms go limp, the shades chiming and beeping a short time later to alert Ambrose it was time to remove the connection and put him back on safely. While Ambrose wouldn’t say he missed having the weight on his face and the shade over his eyes, there was no denying a bit of fondness for the habit. It was nice not having his retinas toasted.

“I see my offer was too much to resist.”

** You’re a bastard. I’ll not have my body sullied like that. If it does something foolish it will be because I will it to do something foolish, not any other way.**

“Sure thing,” Ambrose said as he started up the bridge, pulling his blade out to keep it at the ready, grip light. He resisted the temptation to spin it or do bored tosses like he would while at home or doing detail work on it, keeping his hands ready to put lethal force behind the steel at a moments notice. The bridge itself seemed like it had been used in the past as shelter, or a lookout point. Chairs were arranged beneath a sheet metal roof with a standee wall against the side of a toppled truck, and garbage lay strewn about the broken glass that crunched beneath Bro’s boots. At every turn there could be a human being or worse.. yet all seemed quiet for now. Abandoned. Empty.

Packrat by nature, Bro took a moment to peer into different cars that they passed to see if any of them had been used as more shelter, or used to store any spare belongings that nobody would miss. There didn’t seem to be much on hand, however. Spent shells, empty cans and bottles, ragged blankets, clothes that reeked of sweat and in one car the sweet sickly smell of feces. One front seat had a few gadgets that slowed Ambrose’s steps to peek however, grinning in amusement.

“Oh, hey, I remember readin’ about these things,” he mused, reaching through broken glass to pick up a blocky hand held game system with a melted looking cartridge. The screen was cracked, but the buttons looked well worn. Must’ve taken a lot of abuse to wind up like that, those things were supposedly indestructible in their time. He dropped it back onto the seat it had come from and the bit of bones that rested here and there as well. The original owner? An art project by some bored creep? Hard to guess honestly and not really his place to wonder about.

** There’s something else there** , Hal pointed out, zeroing in the target t’s to direct Bro’s attention to the keychain looking item shaped like an egg. He reached again and plucked it up, rubbing a thumb over the dirty screen with a hum. A flip over and he nodded a bit.

“Some other kinda game I guess..? Looks like it’s self contained and takes a smaller battery. Doubt it’s like yours, is it?”

** No, most likely that type of device ran on a watch battery. Do you not know what it is?**

“Is it not a game?”

** It is a game where you are tasked with keeping a small creature alive by meeting all of its needs and wants.**

Bro snorted. “I’ve raised a baby, I think I can live without a game reproducin’ the experience.”

Yet.. it had been some of the best years of his life. Boiling water to make sure it was safe for Dave’s baby bath, washing hair so fine it was barely there. Messy cheeks in the high chair as he figured out how to feed himself, skinned knees and bandages, late night visitors to his bed whenever there was an electrical storm outside or when the winds screamed out over the desert like hungry dogs. Those big red eyes in the dark asking if it was safe when people came too close to their hidden home, listening to the distant explosions of deterrents and traps going off left and right. Those same red eyes staring up at him for the tenth, the hundreth, the thousandth time he’d knocked him down to make him get back up and keep fighting.

Bro swallowed hard for a moment, throat suddenly uncomfortably dry. He knew it was wrong. He knew deep down it had been too much, but there was no choice. Not when the world wouldn’t hesitate even a single second before putting a bullet in his head if he didn’t take the initiative and attack first. He could tell himself that a thousand times and yet it didn’t change anything.

Bro closed his hand around the toy and stuck it into his pocket without a second’s hesitation.

“Might make for a fun project later though. Maybe I can re-program it, give it a better battery. Somethin’ simple like a time waster to take the edge off should be easy.”

** How many pet projects do you intend to keep on your person?**

“As many as I feel like, considerin’ one is already on my face. What, suddenly attached to the idea of being an only child?”

** I am not a child. If anything, I would prefer if you spoke to me like an adult instead of like one of your wards. Keep it in mind, Bro.**

“Yes Mom.”

** That is not what I meant when I sai-**

“I’m kidding,” Ambrose said as he fished his hand back out of his pocket and continued to walk, suddenly less interested in browsing the potential second hand belongings than he was about getting off the bridge and continuing Northwards. He’d dallied too long as it was, and while things seemed plenty deserted up here, he didn’t want that to stop being a thing any time soon thanks to their broadcast position.

** You know, I don’t think I’ve mentioned this before. But I have radio functionality, if you would enjoy to listen to something as you walk.**

He snorted. “Yeah? The same ten stations, no thanks. Propaganda, interviews with dumbasses, or the same fifty songs over and over. Nobody knows how to find decent music, and the songs that’re any good get played so often you get sick of them. Nobody makes anything new either.”

** I also possess some selections Dirk enjoyed, if you would prefer listening to those. They may prove to be something more to your taste, he was particular about what he listened to.**

“Particular how?”

** He was particularly ardent in enjoying what he liked and stubbornly sitting through what he didn’t like before deleting it from any device he listened to it on. Let me play a sample, ** Hal offered before going quiet and chiming softly to signal he was changing focus. 

Bro stopped walking when the music started, quiet near his ears to not block out incoming noise but loud enough to hear the quickly pronounced words and heavy beat, the tempo driving into his skull enough that he tapped his foot in time with it. Soon he was bobbing his head, catching the tune even without knowing the words, and smirking in amusement.

“Not quite what I’m used to, no. But it’s nice. Feel free to keep’em coming while we head on, yeah? Turn them off if you detect something approaching,” he instructed.

** But of course, Bro. I’m not an idiot, ** said Hal in a more modulated voice than usual behind the thrum of the music.

When he began to walk again, the beat added a new cadence to his step and made the walking go by quicker than before. In no time at all he was over the bridge and on the other side of the water, taking in his surroundings with the same eyes of the curious and the mildly kleptomanic. Every new venue was a new opportunity, especially when there were what looked like stores in the distance. Hell, now that he had his new pet project he’d need a few parts, wouldn’t he?

“...Mm. Hal, that sign says ‘Toys’ in part of the name, right?”

** It would seem so. It was likely a location of the Time For Toys brand from before the war** , Hal offered.  **It could potentially be something else, but the orientation of those letters makes the likelihood of it being anything else quite low.**

“Perfect. Let’s go shoppin’.”

Giving another glance to the toy in his pocket, guessing what size of batteries to keep an eye out for adjustments sake later on, Bro strode towards the building bearing the toy slogan and let himself inside without a second thought.

Perhaps he should have thought twice. There were few places as unnerving as an abandoned toy shop that had sat this long through destruction and disuse. Rows and rows of figurines, dolls, moth eaten soft toys, accessories, and toy cars rested on the shelves and from dangling sorting rods that stuck out at even intervals. Everything was silent save for his footsteps, and Hal kept focusing the t’s on various rodents that were startled by the sudden invasion. As far as humans went, it seemed most had stayed clear. There just wasn’t much use for toys after the war he supposed.

...Okay, bullshit, he kind of wished he’d known this place existed when Dave was a baby. He probably would have loved a lot of these things, instead of making do with the things Bro could make him. Smuppets were amazing, and so were the other puppets and the electronic things, but sometimes a kid just needs a teddybear. He poked one with blue button eyes and sawdust stuffed feet, its floppy soft arms resting alongside its torso with fabric claw tips resting alongside its thighs. The bear fell over with a soft whump and a bit of dust in the air, leaving Bro free to quietly explore the graveyard of toys.

Past a section of toy balls that had long since deflated, baseballs and mitts, were electronic toys. Dollies that talked and horses and dogs and cats that made realistic noises seemed to be all the rage, but along with them hung more of the egg shaped toy he had in his pocket in different colors, still in the package. Whistling softly, still nodding along with the tempo on the song Hal continued to play, he grabbed several of the packages and batteries from the end of the display cap to stuff into his bag.

That was when he saw it. Soft, fluffy, and apparently capable of movement and speech. The small creature was hard to decipher at a glance species wise. It had a beak and two big eyes that could apparently blink when they weren’t staring into your soul, a small sensor in its forehead, and two massive ears. Two fat, pudgy paws rested at its base in front of a set of wheels that offered free movement.

Furby.

An apt name, Bro supposed. The little thing was furry as hell, soft to his rough fingered touch and fairly sweet looking with its black and white fur pattern. The external fluff seemed to safeguard a sizeable chunk of electronics from what he could guess thanks to a testing squeeze. ...Interesting.

** What are you so distracted by now.**

“You think you’d be capable of driving one of these?” Bro asked curiously. “It’s got wheels and seems like it can maneuver around on its own from an AI. Talks too.”

** I’d rather die. So there is your answer.**

“But it’s possible,” Bro continued. “You were able to work that droid back there just fine. Think of how useful this would be for checking out crowded buildings.”

** Wouldn’t an RC car be more useful for exploration purposes.**

“Hey, I never said I wouldn’t mod this thing,” Bro said as he continued to feel the edges of the furby before turning it and cutting the edge of its fur open, removing the skin messily to get a better look at what lay beneath. “Look. See? A lot of these guts’re useless. Could take them out, put better power and mobility, maybe add a weapon.. Maybe connect the innards of a walkie talkie in there too, or some radio parts to keep in contact.”

It was a whole new project idea. The egg toy was one thing, but this. This was something entirely new. And the fact that Hal hated it so much on sight was kind of appealing.

** Are you implying you plan to weaponize a furby.**

“Yes. I’m also implyin’ I’d like to see you pilot the damn thing if I can make it work how I want it to. Could set you loose on a floor and let you roll around doin’ your own damn thing, keep shit off you left and right, let me know what you see. You’d be able to help me out.”

** And the reason I couldn’t do that with the big droid is…?**

“Batteries, bein’ inconspicuous, and portability. I can stuff one of these things in my bag easy, and nobody would expect one of these to be anything important,” he hummed, mind already going wild. Dave would love it.

No, Dave would probably hate it and say he was taunting God but Dave wasn’t here right now and Bro was itching to customize. He glanced back the way he’d come before putting his tongue between his teeth, thinking.. and then grabbing another furby identical to the one he’d de-skinned. He’d need to strip it cleaner, treat it nicer, figure out how these fuckers ticked. Manual was probably in the box somewhere, but even if it wasn’t how hard would it be to figure out a children’s toy?

“I think I know where we’re campin’ tonight. Lemme just grab a few things and we’ll find a spot to nest down.”

** I’m never touching that thing, I have no idea why you look like a child with a new toy.**

“Because I’m a man-child with several new toys,” corrected Bro as he wandered the aisles, looking for radios or walkie talkies. Paydirt came in the form of a pair of ‘authentic army navy walkie talkies’ whose authenticity he seriously doubted even with their rather pretty camouflage patterning just based on the materials he felt beneath his fingers. These casings would be easy enough to pop with his hands, let alone with his tools, they could really have stood to make these sturdier. He’d kill for a good blowtorch though, maybe make some kind of a shell underneath the furby fur to-

** You’re a maniac. You do know that, correct? I can’t hear your thoughts but the things you’re looking at are alarming when placed with the potential logic.**

“I think you mean genius, thanks. Shoosh now, I’m tryin’ to find Frankenfurb some more parts,” Bro hummed, tucking the walkie talkies beneath his arm before finding a shopping basket. There. Much better. Like a pre-war man he wandered the aisles, snagging things that looked useful or interesting or, in the case of his eventual sleeping, soft. His sleeping spot back behind the main register ina protected circle of countertops was soon piled high with plushes and surreptitiously dotted with his electronic findings and various tidbits he planned to use for parts. Doll clothes, while overall worthless to him, still had elastic bands inside of them and the fabric wasn’t flammable. Useful. He even found a child size pair of sunglasses he’d already made plans for, so long as he was able to control the melting properly.

Peeling off his boots and settling back with his supper, Bro opened his bag and set to work toying with his new toys. First everything had to be opened and examined, taken apart, and in some places scrapped entirely down to their base components until he had a small pile of tidbits at his disposal. The toy from earlier seemed to be damaged even when he tried to power it on, but the new packaged replacements just needed to have their old battery removed and replaced with something new to turn on. He already knew how he wanted to update it, especially since there seemed to be a data port that would fit Hal’s cable to it. He failed to say it, but it would be a good emergency backup for transportation should anything ever happen to the shades.

The furby would be his prize. Off went its two toned furry skin, out came its voice box and innards, and in went an assortment of new parts.. Including a salvaged port from one of the extra egg toys Bro had grabbed. He’d worked well into the night by the time he put the skin back on and proudly wiped the beak clean before adding the tiny shades, grinning proudly at it.

“Might need some more tweakin’, and I wanna get a proper laser to put in the thing.. But for now it should be able to move around easier and communicate back to the matchin’ walkie talkie,” he said, gesturing over to his creation with both hands and a wide smile.

** It’s hideous.**

“You’re gonna be in there eventually, Hal, mark my words.”

** If it comes down to being a matter of life or death, I consider my life to have been a full one until you can repair me properly.**

“You’d rather be dead than have some mobility and autonomy while helpin’ me out?” Bro asked, rummaging in his bag for some water to quench his thirst, using a bit more to wipe his face with now that sleep was settling into his brain.

** Did I fucking stutter.**

“All I hear is someone who’s bitchy and in denial about the frankenfurb.”

Bro’s vision faded briefly to display those red eyes once more, though this time they were giving a decided roll before his vision faded back in.

** When a furby is on the line, Bro, I will be as bitchy as I please.**


	4. Treasures New and Old

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From weaponized Furbies to old school prewar technology, Bro is finding his hands in many pies. Hal wishes he'd leave the pies the fuck alone for the most part.

The small wheels of the Furby were sturdy enough to handle the terrain inside of the building with ease, so long as the bigger debris was avoided. These weren’t monster truck wheels, after all. Every so often a ping would be sent back to Bro’s location in the stairwell where he was secured out of sight, ready to be back up once Hal was done exploring and mapping out the place. He’d already covered significant ground, only needing assistance when it came to changing floors, and was holding his own against some of the mutated pests that had taken up residence in the various empty rooms.

The modified laser was perfect for quick shots, and most of the critters seemed to be expecting humans or at least food they could smell. The small mechanical device wasn’t very appetizing looking, more of a curiosity. Bro was pretty sure he’d never seen giant insects that close up before unless they were dead, the radiation having done a number on their dna sequences since the war. Their protruding eyes were kind of fascinating to see up close, though Bro was content to watch from his distance rather than get hands on.

**I don’t appreciate this, you know**

“Don’t appreciate what,” Bro said into his end of the walkie talkie. “Freedom to move around? Weapons to protect yourself with?”

**I don’t appreciate being stuffed into this toy and you damn well know it.**

“Cry me a river and check the next hallway, I’ve got a feelin’ there’ll be somethin’ good there.” 

**There were other toys there. You could have put me in something useful. Something sturdier. Something-**

“What the fuck is that thing?” said a voice from further down the hallway Hal was trundling down. A human who’d been living rough for some time, with attitudes that were even rougher judging from the wild clothing they wore, came into view. A man, when he got close enough to be seen clearly. A raider, if some of the markings on his clothes were authentic and not just slapped on for fun. Great, just what he fucking needed, a pack of wild men to deal with.

“Find something to eat?” called another voice. Bro quietly grunted and got up out of his hiding spot to go get ready. Humans could be destructive with shit they didn’t understand, and the last thing he wanted to do was lose Hal. He’d become pretty attached to the AI by now, and losing him wasn’t an option anymore, not with the end goal being so interesting to him.

“Nah, just found… something. I don’t know what this thing is,” the first man admitted, reaching down to snatch the Furby off the ground after a few attempts, the small wheels motoring this way and that to avoid being picked up. “Some kinda toy?”

“What, find a new teddy bear?” joked the other voice out of view.

“Nah. This thing’s cute though,” he chuckled, touching the spinning wheels and the moving beak before setting it back down on the ground. The Furby failed to move. “Hey, c’mon over and get a look while it’s still.”

The second man finally appeared, itching his back with the baseball bat he held, hair tied back into a messy bun. He popped a squat in front of the still Furby and smirked.

“Aw. Lookit the lil shit, it’s cu-”

_ Zap. _

The laser was probably overkill as far as power went, but Bro was proud of the addition and how stable it proved to be. The fact that Hal was a killer shot was just a bonus, landing the guy right between the eyes before the guy could get the word out all the way, dropping him like a sack of potatoes. The first man panicked and jumped back as the Furby zoomed back to life and backed up several paces.

**Bitch.**

Bro was able to take a shot towards the man’s shoulder with his sword before turning and cracking him upside the head with a fist, sending him down in a bleeding pile. Nothing like a small fluffy creature buzzing on the floor after firing a deadly laser to act as a distraction for a 6’6 man with a sword creeping up on ya. It probably would have been more prudent to use long range… but sometimes he just needed to have an excuse to clean his sword off rom residue that wasn’t radroach or abomination. 

“Y’know, you could’ve just singed him and he might’ve run. I was on my way,” Bro said, nudging the dead fellow with a toe of his boot. “I don’t think he even has anything interestin’ on him.”

**I hold no apologies for being called ‘cute’. **

“You’re right, you’re adorable. How dare they.”

**Laser has entered the cooldown period. You’re lucky.**

“Your own fault for shootin’ full force, if you want to roast me you’re gonna need to learn your limits first Hal,” Bro said as he abandoned the toy and walked ahead to peek in different doors. Big fat load of nothing… till he found the place the second man had come from. Paydirt. A temporary camp site, complete with food and water. Packaged food, no less, prewar and sturdy enough to last ages thanks to its healthy doses of preservatives. Giving a pleased whoop of joy, Bro took off his bag and took to stuffing what he could carry into it, taking his time to look around for other important looking things. Keys, cards, electronic tidbits that might be useful, ammunition. Bandages. Christ could he use some bandages, or disinfectant, he’d forgotten to stock up on extras at the last place they’d stayed and it was going to bite him in the ass, he could just feel it.

While he found some disinfectant in the form of a high octane liquor, the bandages were at least sanitary looking and standard. Eh. A drink and something to clean with. It’d work. Otherwise interestingly he found a notebook, one with most of the pages in it no less. Perfect. He’d be able to write Dave again tonight and send the letter off when they hit a trader or a town next. Right on schedule.

...Or maybe too much of a schedule. Kid was probably being inundated with letters and not sure what to do with them since he couldn’t write back. If he even wanted to.

Bro paused for a moment before grabbing the notebook and stuffing it into his bag after all. If Dave read his letters or threw them in the trash, at least he was reaching out on his end and showing he was willing to talk. It was the best he could do, he supposed. Be there and be ready for replies if they came.

**You’re going to get fat if you eat all that processed garbage. Why did junk food survive but next to none of the decent food survive.**

“Preservatives and chemicals for flavorin’,” Bro said, snapping out of his thoughts. The one man was only knocked out, after all, not dead. He’d be coming to eventually, best to be long gone by then. “When there’s more chemicals than food in the package, the food’ll last through goddamn anything.”

**I’m starting to think that if you encountered a fresh vegetable you would collapse inwardly like a dying star.**

“Everything I’ve ever come into contact with had some traces of radiation in it, it’s part of the post-apocalyptic lifestyle, Hal. It’s just a waitin’ game to see how much will make you sick and how much just adds a zesty aftertaste.”

**...I’m unable to tell if you’re joking or not and that is concerning for my future mobility. I can hear the atherosclerosis from here.**

“All you can hear are the dulcet tones of my voice, admit it,” Bro said, giving one last look around the room before reaching for Hal. The laser fired a small zap, stinging his hand and making him yank it back, watching the toy zip around in circles teasingly. “Ah c’mon, don’t be a lil shit. I was gonna put you back in the glasses. Don’t you like the glasses more than the Furby?”

**I like many things more than the Furby.**

“C’mere then,” Bro said, reaching down to snatch the toy up by its fuzzy body, the weight more substantial now than it had been fresh out of the box. The skin was stretched taut over all kinds of goodies now, and he was careful as he plugged the shades into the side of the Furby by way of the metallic port, waiting and watching as the small loading symbols flickered in front of his eyes. Once again, Hal’s eyes opened in front of his own, pupils dilating briefly in recognition before they flickered away and he was left with the usual interface once more.

“There. Better?”

**If you really loved me you’d have built something better with all those spare parts.**

“I don’t love you. I tolerate you.”

**Frankenfurby is a token of your affections as surely as your letters to your spawn are.**

“Those’re different,” Bro murmured, tucking the doll away carefully in his bag and securing it closed. He wasn’t sure if he could hear groaning or was just paranoid, but better to leave than to find out. Slowly, he backtracked down the hallway past the felled men before speeding up to the stairwell, hurrying down and out of the building while he could. All in all a successful scavenge, his luck was really holding out now that he had his new toy.

Friend.

… Yeah, he’d call Hal a friend now. Maybe prematurely, but it was hard not to bond with someone whose sense of humor was so similar to his own, bot or not.

**Are we still on target to approach where my body was last being kept?**

“Should be. I’m only swervin’ once in a while to find places to stay, or to get goodies after all. There’s a few places I’d love to hit between here and there, though it’d be too rough goin’ for the furb to be active.”

**What are these locations you are wanting to go to and why.**

“Well, one of’ems a vault. I know if there’s people in it they’d be good for tradin’ with and prolly have somewhere to stay or know where it’d be good to stay in the region. If it’s a decrepit one it’d prolly been picked clean… if you give up after the first few areas,” Bro smirked. “Dig deep and pick enough locks, know how to sweet talk the electronics, and usually you’ll find a treasure trove of some kind. Or at least so I’d assume, given that I’ve not exactly crawled my way through enough to formulate a mean average on accessibility to the damn things.”

Hal whirred briefly as if thinking before speaking up.  **What kinds of things would you be hoping to obtain from there that you cannot obtain from elsewhere that we’ve been going into? These ‘goodies’ you mention.**

“More prewar things mostly,” Bro said as he sized up a slope and skidded down it with his feet turned. He had to sit down once, scuffing his ass, but he made it to the bottom without falling at all. A quick dust, and he was back en route. “Food, ammunition. Weapons. Medical supplies is a big important one. Old prewar tech is like findin’ the needle in the haystack, but once you find it it’s sweet.”

**Old prewar tech like what, more odds and ends?**

“Sometimes. Sometimes it’s more like findin’ entire bots untouched in their charging bays,” he explained, eyeing the surroundings cautiously. He was more exposed out here, and he didn’t exactly enjoy it, but sometimes it was a choice between being exposed and being boxed into an area chock full of super mutants.

No thank you, he’d take his chances out here thanks. Could hear and see shit coming that way while he was awake.

**Would these untouched bots have data cables perchance.**

“I’m not uploadin’ you into a Gutsy, Hal.”

**I’D BE SO MUCH MORE USEFUL, YOU’D BE MISSING OUT!**

“I like you bein’ portable. I also like you not bein’ capable of friendly fire. No, I didn’t forget that laser earlier, you fuck, my hand still stings from it.”

**Okay, what if instead of uploading me into a Gutsy you uploaded me into the mainframe computer? ** reasoned Hal.  **I could manually override everything in place since lockdown, and likely would be able to communicate with you through various data ports.**

Bro’s steps slowed a bit. That, he liked the sound of. Just need to make it to the overseers office and make sure it was clear before uploading him… or maybe even uploading him from another unit, if it was still functional.

“If you ever got stuck in there, would you be patient and wait for me to figure out how to get you out?”

**And give up the God like control I would have over the giant rodent population? You tease me.**

“I’ll take that as a yes, and an Okay for where to head to next,” he hummed.

If he could make it out of there with enough swag, he could sell the extra and have plenty to spend till the end of the mission. ...Was that what this was now? A mission? A mission to get to an AI’s body that may or may not even exist...for what. There was no guarantee Hal would even want to stay with him at the end of all of this. Odds are he’d get freedom and go running with it like Dave had, leaving Bro on his lonesome again.

The thought put an unpleasant knot in his stomach. No, Daave hadn’t run away, he’d grown up and left the nest like everyone else did eventually. And even if Hal DID leave him behind, so what? He’d have had a bit of an adventure, restocked his cash supply, probably gotten more things to keep himself busy with. There’d be more stories to tell over a few shots of booze, more things to write to Dave about, and more things to remember when he was old.

Nothing happened without a reason. This wasn’t a fruitless venture, he’d already had more fun than he assumed was possible.

**Are you okay?** Hal asked suddenly.

“Huh? Yeah, why.”

**Your eyes looked pensive and you seemed miles away. No reaction to the mole rat coming in from the left.**

Cussing, Bro turned and whipped his sword out, raising it up to-

“...Hal. Where’s the mole rat,” Bro asked, scanning around in circles with his weapon raised.

**It’s fictional, but you proved my point about being distracted quite well.**

“Hal. I’m gonna bust you into twenty pieces if you keep that shit up.”

**Do you wish to talk about it? The things that were catching your thoughts.**

“You my therapist now?”

**Curiosity has captured me and you’re the nearest target.**

“I was thinkin’ about the nearest vault and what we might find in it,” he lied. Hal’s loading screen flashed in front of his eyes again before the outdated map appeared like a hazy display over reality.

**If we continue at the current ambling pace it would take till tomorrow evening to reach the nearest vault, given that nothing between here and there has become too irradiated to support living creatures or has become irradiated enough to support terrible living creatures.**

“One way to find out, huh.”

  
  


\- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

  
  


The vault was an opened one, leaving the usual rundown of various critters to deal with near the entrance. Pests. This was his pearl to unearth, not theirs to eat. They could have the leftovers, maybe he’d crumble up a bag of chips and leave’em nearby as a peace offering or something, not that the dumb animals would understand or appreciate it at all. As it was he took potshots at some of them and just stomped on the insects before they could be a problem, wiping goo off his shoes on the metal rack steps inside the big steel door. It smelled damp somewhere, made sense. The rest of the air just smelled old and musty, rusted. Worn down. There was still electricity though, these bastards really were meant to last.

Bro made his way through a few doors before finding his way to some signs, following them to the main recreation area. Graffiti tagged the walls with various people he’d never heard of and probably never would know of, and most of the things were picked over or left broken open to rot. Raiders. Messy fuckers, lived somewhere for a while then moved on when the supplies ran out.

Just meant there was probably gold in there further than the numbskulls could reach, and he just had to be patient.

Paydirt came when Bro finally found a computer monitor that was not only unbroken but accessible to the main system, taking a seat to toy with the keys for a while. He spent some time reading old logs, scouring it for data that might be useful, keys being left somewhere or security being heightened in different areas. Not much to work from, though. He pursed his lips and made a soft tutting sound before shaking his head and standing.

**Aren’t you going to upload me?**

“Not here, no. If I find a security terminal maybe, or if I can get to the Overseer’s office, that’d be the best shit. You’d have access to a wider percentage of the place, if not all of it once the override’s overridden.”

**You underestimate me, I could probably reach there before you.**

“You could also get firewalled by some shit you’re encoded with because you’re still an AI tryin’ to hack somethin’. ‘Sides, I’d rather have the company for now,” Bro chuckled.

**At least the scenery is interesting. I believe the last three dicks on the walls were larger than the first three dicks on the walls.**

“We’re in the tainted parts,” Bro said, hopping a barrier to reach the first locked door they’d encountered. Smirking, he pulled off his bag and got a few small tools out, sparking the data screen back to life after a few minutes of jimmying the wires. He made quick work of it, letting the door open before allowing the charge to drop, rendering the door permanently open.

“Child’s play,” he said softly, putting the tools into his pocket in case they were needed sooner rather than later before letting himself walk through and down the much better conditioned hallway. There was no graffiti here, but the smell of mildew was still strong, meaning there must have been a leak somewhere. Internal leak was one thing, an external meant radiation. “Hal, keep a geiger check goin’, warn me if we’re gettin’ anywhere too hairy.”

**There are elevated levels, but they’re within the safe amount so long as you don’t do something foolish like sleep back here.**

“Figured. Don’t worry, I don’t feel very tired right now.”

If anything he felt alert, awake, ready to fight. He almost wished something would lurch around the dimly lit corner thirsting for his blood so he could decapitate it. Stress presenting itself in violent ways was just a part of life here, and fuck could he use some stress relief before the night was up. Getting here had been more stressful than he assumed, involving some stealthing past massive horned abominations with razor sharp claws and dealing with some leatherbound fuckheads who just HAD to decide he was worth heckling.

Another bit of wandering, most rooms not holding anything useful or worth lugging out of there, Bro finally hit jackpot. The overseers office wasn’t locked down, it seemed. The bloodstain on the wall gave a few clues to why that may be, but the lack of a skeleton to follow up with made the guessing game all the more interesting in his opinion. Hopping into the creaking leather seat, he rustled for the connection cable from his bag.

“Ready, Hal? I want you to light the place up, unlock shit, and see if you can access the sound system,” Bro rattled off, instructing the AI as if those weren’t the things he was already planning to do.

**I’ll send feedback to these monitors as well, no doubt there are some cameras still working** , Hal promised, eagerly awaiting the moment of plugin.

Briefly, Bro was concerned he’d caused a power outage. The room went pitch black, as did the rest of the vault that he could see from the rounded window and doorway, save for the monitor in front of him.

“Hal? Fuck.”

The screen flashed green, before taking on a red hue as pixels fell by the wayside. A small loading screen image appeared, same as in the glasses.

**Loading. Loading. Loading,** came a voice from the sound system around him, soothing and methodical. In the distance, however, Bro heard unworldly screeching and hisses, and his blood ran cold.

“Lights back on any time, Hal.”

**Loading. Loading. Loading.**

More hisses and screams, this time closer, reacting every time they heard a voice on the speakers.

“Haaaaaal. Any time now would be pretty fuckin’ sweet,” Bro hissed, slowly sinking down below the desk and pulling his weapon out, hiding but prepared as he waited.

The lights flickered back on, too bright and intense enough to sting his eyes before lowering back down to the softer indoor degree. Bro scooted out and lifted up enough to look at the screen, smirking when he saw a small, digitized version of a human with red eyes and white hair doing a bouncing dance in the corner. This wasn’t a simple data upload, it was practically a hijacking.

“...Hal? Can you hear me?”

No response. Frowning, Bro looked up to the corners to find the cameras, repeating himself.

“Can you hear me?”

**No. But I can see you. I can see a lot of things.**

“Show me,” he mouthed towards the cameras before looking to the displays once more. It was like he’d feared: those hisses weren’t just in his head. The place was lousy with feral ghouls, and fuck if that was one thing he hated dealing with. Normal ghouls? Chill folks. Feral ghouls were a goddamn mess that didn’t stop hitting and they were smart enough to run while aiming for the soft bits. At least they weren’t infectious like in those old books he’d seen. Prewar people had been obsessed with the idea of the living dead. Well, congratulations fuckers: you were the reason they existed now.

He assumed his sword could get through most of them, the rest he’d need to aim for the head to take down. Biting his lip, Bro stood up and took the chair once more, typing to get a more detailed message across to Hal in case the simplistic lip reading couldn’t carry over. 

_ Can you unlock the doors? _

**Done and done.**

_ Is there a path towards the medical bay or security room that isn’t littered with ghouls? _

**Negative. Your new friends are everywhere and they don’t seem very happy to hear me.**

“God damn it, of course, the two places I wanna hit and they’re crawlin’,” Bro hissed in disgust. 

_ Do you have a clear view of these areas? _

**Absolutely** , Hal said before the camera views changed again, showing different hallways and signs, then finally the interior of the medical bay and the security office. Each had its own ghouls, but even from there Bro could see enough treasure that his mouth watered. Treasure in ammo boxes and containers that weren’t rusted and permeated with water. Treasure in medical cabinets, maybe even some chems. Bro was absolutely not above using chems if the need arose in a fight or the interest was high enough in a calm moment, but the thought of having prewar chems that not only were in good condition but plentiful?

“Lock and load, Hal.”


	5. Paper Trail

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clearing the vault of goodies is just par for the course, but what else can be found inside the hidden walls?

The first wave of ghouls was nothing to sniff at, easily dissected and dispatched enough despite the sturdy vault uniforms that they stopped trying to get up and chew at his shoes. Bro made his way steadily along the pathways, slowing now and then to peek into rooms that didn’t sound like there was an occupant within to check for extra things he might find useful or interesting. Slim pickings, but with the promise of the medical bay and the security office ahead, he could cope with the loss of a few potential trinkets.

By the time he reached the medical bay he’d been splattered with plenty of unsavory things, blowback from the dispatching, but it was worthwhile. The chems lay fairly undisturbed in their cases, warning labels and information packs still tucked away with them. Quick fixes for injuries, infections, and potential tight spots or slow evenings were now at his disposal, and Bro didn’t waste time stuffing his bag tight as he could with capped and boxed products, jamming empty spaces with bandages. If he grabbed much more he’d need a makeshift bag to sling over his shoulder to get out with, but there was no way he was going to leave this treasure behind. If he didn’t use it, he knew everyone in the remnants of the world wanted to get their hands on good pre-war meds. Even with all the time that had passed, they were still more potent and more reliable than the freshly made ones the labs were trying to pump out or the campfire remedies some people had to swear by out here made of fuck knew what radiated sources.

He knew, realistically, that he should probably take Hal back out and make his way out of here with his ill gotten goods and call it a day. Bro knew. ...But he also knew he couldn’t turn down the opportunity to find just a bit more. He still preferred his sword for most things, but fuck could he not turn down the chance at getting a nice new side piece. There were no doubt electronics and odds and ends in that office as well, probably some clothing in lockers. Maybe one of the people had feet similar in size to his and had left a spare pair of shoes around, his own were getting a bit rough in the treads.

Come on, stop fantasizing. There were still ferals to take care of, and Hal was probably wondering why he was just standing there instead of hopping to it.

What started as a steady walking pace gave way to a quicker jog, then a sprint as he heard the shrill cries and hisses in the distance, sword at the ready. He used the momentum to behead a few of the creatures, not wanting to worry about the vault uniforms integrity like before, wanting to render them immobile quickly. He skidded to a staggered halt when he reached a corner and saw a glow, however.

This feral ghoul was glowing intensely and walking at a slow pace as if weighed down by the radiation it carried, clothing mere scraps on its naked form, remnants of its skin hanging in shreds over exposed muscle and patchy edges of bone on its face.

“Christ, what did you do, live in the leak’s source for a few hundred years?” he asked aloud softly, trying not to set it off.

Wishful thinking. The barest sound that was out of place caught the creature’s focus, the hiss turning vicious before it began to run at him. Bro could feel his nose trying to bleed the closer the thing got to him, could taste the copper in the back of his mouth, the taste of bile in his throat as his body raged against the wrongness in the air as much as against the smell of cooked rotting meat that exuded from this thing like an aura.

It lunged, he dodged, and danced backwards with it charging and missing, trying to find the right way to aim at it. It was stronger than the others, he didn’t think he’d be able to take it down with just a neck strike. No... He’d need to be a bit creative. Turning, Bro ran back down the hallway towards the medical room, listening to the soggy footfalls rushing behind him along with his pulse in his ears. Think, think, think, needed to get this thing away, needed to get a good hit on it, needed to do more than just pepper it with bullets and swing at it. Needed to put it down.

Once he was in the medical room, Bro vaulted over one of the beds and grasped it, kicking the brake off so he could turn the gurney more effectively. As if expecting a showdown of sorts, the feral ghoul paused and took a deep breath before releasing a pulse of the radioactive energy it held, another shockwave that finally made blood drip from Bro’s nose in a thin rivulet even as he shouted and charged with the gurney, pinning the creature against the wall. Wedging it several feet away and holding it in place with his hips, Bro was able to take the shots he needed more effectively: a few well placed rounds between the eyes followed by a quick decapitation when its head sagged forwards.

Just in case.

**Are you done playing with it now? ** came a sardonic voice from the room’s loudspeaker.  **Or are you planning on taking trophies?**

“Already took trophies from this room,” Bro said after looking for where the camera likely was, shaking his head No for emphasis. “More of those?” he asked, gesturing to the still glowing remains slumped over the end of the gurney and spattered on the wall before slicing his sword through the air a few times, forcing the coagulated blood into the proper channel and clearing the blade of the worst of it. Like fuck was he could to be touching that bare handed. He’d wipe it off on someone’s old dress shirt or something in a locker, or cake it in some dirt before washing it off. Something to create a barrier between himself and the taint.

He sniffed, then snorted and hocked a loogie, spitting the bloody mass out onto the floor without much thought. Deal with that later.

**I see no further glowing ferals. I do see some in combat uniforms, however. Sword will not be effective. Stealth is recommended** , Hal said, though the hisses and shrieks in the distant halls were kind of putting a damper on any planned stealth.

Bro pointed at himself then, at his bleeding nose, and quirked a brow.

**I doubt you have received a deadly dose. I recommend avoiding further contact with the remains, to ensure this fact. No cuddling the dead things.**

“You’re no fun,” he said, hocking once more and spitting for distance, fist pumping briefly when it hit a far wall. Hell yeah. Good distance.

**You’re disgusting.**

“Humans are,” he said, looking towards the camera to ensure Hal could see him.

**Dirk was not disgusting.**

Ambrose shook his head and snorted in amusement. He glanced towards the hall once more before adjusting his grip on his weapons and heading out again, creeping along this time in order to get as close to the hissing from the security office as he could without setting any of the feral ghouls off. He crawled the last of the way, settling low on his knees to take aim at the first ghoul he saw before frowning.

God damn it. Major body armor. Of course they were wearing it when they died, riot gear seemed to be the norm, but what he wouldn’t give for an ill prepared security officer feral for once in his fucking life, one who left his untouched armor in a storage container for someone to come along later and take. Someone with broad shoulders preferably.. A second, then a third emerged before Bro finally took a shot, squinting as he aimed for the sweet spot between the disintegrating eyes. It staggered, but didn’t fall. Instead it hissed his general direction and the others looked towards him as if taking cues. Another shot and it finally went down, causing the others to startle and head his direction.

Cussing, Bro prepared to let loose a few sprayed shots, but didn’t get the chance before he heard a metallic grating noise and the whirr of machinery. A turret. While the turret in the ceiling wasn’t as clear and precise of a shot as Bro’s pistol was, it proved to be effective in sheer numbers of bullets sprayed, managing to hit sensitive spots as much as it hit and tore into aged body armor. While Bro was grateful, he didn’t know what to make of it. Why had the turret suddenly activat-

“Hal.”

As if to test this theory, Bro slowly stood up and dusted his aching knees off before sauntering into clear view of the turret, pistol in one hand while both were raised in a stereotypical ‘don’t shoot’ stance.

**Targets have been eliminated.**

“...Could you have activated that turret at any time.”

**I have full command of the turrets.**

“Multiple?”

**I have full command of the turrets** , Hal repeated over the speakers.

“...Why didn’t you just clear some of these fuckers out for me,” he muttered in annoyance, approaching the first ghoul and crouching to check its body and pockets for anything useful. There was rarely anything good on dead ghouls, but sometimes they died with useful things strapped to their bodies. In this case, the most he found was some gum that had definitely seen better days and key cards he didn’t have a need for now that Hal was sitting pretty in the mainframe. 

With them looked over, Bro turned his attention to the desks and drawers in the office, wanting to check for keys before he got started plundering this location as well. By the time he finished scouring and searching every nook and cranny of the room, not only had he filled his pockets with some extra ammunition, but he’d found a better condition pistol that fired beautifully and some goodies to tinker with that should enhance it somewhat without ruining its durability. Bless properly stored weapons. It made him feel a little nostalgic leaving his own gun behind, but that was just something that happened out here. Find better, take better when you can.

Feeling that he’d looted more than enough and dealt with plenty, Bro stretched and settled into the creaking office chair at a functional computer and decided to talk to Hal.

_ I think I’ve taken everything not nailed down. Are you ready to get back in your glasses? _

**There is one area I would like you to check for me before it is time to leave.**

That was unexpected. Bro lifted a brow and continued to type.

_ To check for you? Why can’t you check it yourself, is there not a camera inside? _

**There is a camera inside, which is why I want you to go look for me. I have seen a file room, and one of the files said Dirk Strider on it. There is not a digital copy in the mainframe that I can find, so if this is correspondence it may have been personally written by Dirk himself or about Dirk. I wish to know what it says.**

_ Where is the file room? _

**An area tainted with water, but the file in question and perhaps more seem to be safely above the water line.**

Water. Radioactive water, no doubt. Bro grimaced and ran his tongue over his teeth, still tasting a bit of blood from earlier behind his lips.  _ How high is this water line, I’m not signing up for a swim. _

**Over your head at its deepest, knee high at its shallowest.**

_ Excuse me, over my head?? _

**Yes, the deepest regions of this vault appear to be flooded. The most you will encounter is knee high I believe. You need to go downstairs to obtain this file access.**

_ And after I get this file, you’ll get back in the glasses and we can go, right? How radiated is this water, should I be worried? _

**The radiation level is tolerable for someone of your size and stature, though I would not recommend drinking it or bathing in it for prolonged periods of time.**

_ Right then. Get the file, download you, and then peace out, _ Bro finished, slapping the keyboard to send the message before peering at the location on the map Hal presented to him. Okay. A bit of legwork, probably a few more critters to deal with here and there, but not bad. He could find this place easy peasy.

Once he got moving to find the stairs, it was actually easier to follow his nose than anything else. The smell of mildew and stale water was stronger this direction, and the first wet step Ambrose hit made him frown as it was rusted and coated with a faint slime of age long passed. He backtracked a pace or two to sit down and peel his boots and socks off, tying the laces together and slinging them over his shoulder with the socks tucked into a toe before rolling his pants cuffs up as much as he could. They’d still get soaked no doubt, but damn it he tried.

The bottom step gave way to nearly thigh depth water, and Ambrose cursed under his breath for Hal’s misguided assumption that it was only knee deep.

“Whose fucking knee are we talkin’ here, a mutants??” he muttered sourly, gripping at once clean ground with his toes to keep from sliding on the slick surface as he began to slosh his way along. With a bit of hunting, he found several offices, and eventually the one that he remembered from the map. True to Hal’s word, there was a folder on top of a file cabinet marked Dirk Strider. Ambrose snatched it before looking into the drawers above the water, curious to see if anything else had survived the flooding that might be useful, but didn't’ see anything beyond Ms and Ns. He glanced around once more in the room before calling it quits and vacating the area with the file clutched tightly in his hand, ascending the watery stairs and walking a ways barefoot so he’d dry off more before putting his socks and boots back on.

**If you proceed forward four rooms to your right, there is a terminal you can access to download me** , came Hal’s voice from the hall speakers a few dozen feet away.  **Unless you would rather remove me closer to the exit.**

He’d rather have Hal back sooner rather than later, honestly, which was a thought that surprised him. Having the all seeing eye aspect was useful, but the brief time spent apart was strange after the time spent traveling together.

...Was he really that lonesome, now that Dave was gone? He had to be, considering the main things on his mind was getting Hal back and settling down to write a letter again. His comfort habit that was probably going to bite him in the ass eventually. Not writing wasn’t an option, though. Even if Dave just burnt the letters, just having someone else out there in the world that knew he was alive, that had a safe space available, was important for survival.

...Or would Dave even consider the space safe anymore?

Rather than putting Hal back into the Furby, Bro plugged the shades in directly and let him download himself back into his portable home. The lights flickered briefly, but without the hissing and snarling of feral ghouls in the distance it wasn’t nearly as threatening as before. When the dancing figure left the screen behind, returning to the shades, they began to faintly glow as systems came back online. They were honestly still stupid looking, but once Bro put the shades back on, it felt like coming home in a strange way.

**Welcome back.**

“I believe that’s my line,” Bro said, tucking the connection wire back where it had come from and heading into the empty halls. His boots tapped and crunched dust and debris underfoot, but at least he wasn’t as soggy as he could have been. An improvement. Though, speaking of soggy-

“Hal, run a system check on me if you would. Do I need to take any meds soon? That water was awful.”

**As I said before you should be fine, low level exposure won’t do much damage short term.**

“And long? I plan on livin’ a long life, Hal.”

**You should probably use some chems then.**

Bro clicked his tongue and smirked. “That’s right, I nearly forgot the rest of my treasure trove… Damn, gonna be a good night tonight.”

**When do you intend to check the file? Are we going outside first? I want to see.**

“Let’s get outta here and somewhere further out to settle down for the night, then we can flip through the file all you want and get all the gossip about this Dirk guy we can find.”

Hal was quiet as they exited the vault. It was a little worrisome, normally he was chatty and full of wisecracks, but Bro guessed that file really meant a lot to him. The travel to new shelter was simple enough, Bro deciding to bed down for the evening in an open building that had enough cover for him to rest and relax comfortably. There hadn’t been any sign of pests or people to bother him, and between finally getting to stretch out on his bedroll and getting a drink of water and a bite to eat, he was pleased enough.

“Right. Let’s take a peek at this bitch,” Bro murmured as he plucked up the file once more. Hal’s sensors lit up and focused in on the name before adjusting the zoom back to normal so Ambrose could see properly to open it up.

**… This must be the incorrect Dirk Strider, he was not involved in experiments like this** , reasoned Hal as Ambrose continued to read down the file, flipping the pages as he finished.

“I think it’s the same guy. How many Dirk Striders would there’ve been?” Bro said, tapping at the page. “See? You’re mentioned here. The AR line of artificial intelligence.”

**This still doesn’t make sense. Dirk was never involved in psychological experiments.**

“Vault Tec had a record of runnin’ some weird ass experiments apparently. I’ve heard of some strange ones people’ve found paperwork about, or who even survived and escaped from,” Bro said with a shake of his head. “And Vault Tec was the biggest thing for ages.”

**I still don’t believe-**

“Start believin’,” Bro rumbled.

Dirk Strider had been propositioned for use of variants of his AI to help run various experiments, it seemed like. The proposed experiment for that vault didn’t have time to get off the ground before the war happened, leaving it to run the solo experiment by Vault Tec proper… but some of the implications of the proposed experiment were chilling.

**I was meant to be an android, an artificial intelligence, not some proctor for human suffering.**

“Maybe your lil robo siblings were gonna be used instead. You with the wrinkles ironed out and the quirky attitude in check.”

**Lobotomized you mean.**

“More or less, yeah,” Bro said as he continued to read, this time aloud to himself. “Subjects would be required to perform specific tasks under the guidance of the AI system, with increasing hostility towards a proposed target. The proposed target would be chosen at random, and switch periodically. The more often the same target is picked, however, there is a chance that the hostility levels from before would remain just as high as it had left off, resulting in damage or even death to the target. The proposed experiment is trying to gauge how long it would take for instigated hostility to die down between new and old chosen targets, to see if rage and hatred can lessen over time, or if it continues in a solid wave one initiated and rewarded.”

Hal was quiet again, and Bro continued to read till he reached the end of the file.

“So he was studyin’ rage on the side? Or was buddy buddy with people who were at least.”

**Why would an AI be required for this type of test?**

“It says here that the AI would be used as a directive because it would be an extension of an authority figure. I guess it’s also playin’ on how much authority figures weigh in on what people do, and ‘cause you’re so human like you’d be more adept at gettin’ people to follow your orders,” Bro mused, before finally setting the file aside and digging into his bag. Chems first, more food and drink after to get rid of the rush of nausea that always came with any kind of IV fluid, especially one that left such a bitter taste in his mouth.

After the treatment, Bro sat back and cracked open his water again, taking a slug before popping open a second can of beans to enjoy while he was fully stocked. Living the high life, he rolled to his stomach and took out his paper and pen, starting to write to Dave once more.

**You are aware of the chances of receiving a letter back at your rate of travel are slim to none, correct?**

“You’re gonna make me smudge,” Bro murmured, going back to make a letter stand out properly before continuing to write. “And yeah, I know.”

**Why do you continue to send all these letters, then? It’s a fruitless task.**

“Why do you keep lookin’ for info about this Dirk fellow if he’s already long dead? Fruitless task,” Bro snarked right back, frowning and pausing his writing a moment later. “...Okay, that was kind of a dick thing to say. I’m sorry, Hal.”

**Do you believe it’s possible for someone like myself to have hope, Bro?**

“Hope?”

**Yes, hope, as a concept. I think it’s possible for artificial life forms to have hope, even if it’s slim hope. Though that is, as far as I have been able to tell, a distinctly human trait. Is my hope different from yours?**

“Depends,” Bro said, resting his chin on his folded arm. “What’s your hope?”

**I have found myself holding out hope that Dirk survived somehow, or at least some imprint of himself has. Some record of his thoughts, his brain, his feelings. I would have liked to be able to converse with him freely once I was functional and in my body.**

“Only converse? It sounds like you love the guy,” snorted Bro.

**Love?**

...Fuck him, did he really have to explain the concept of love to an AI?

**I’m just fucking with you, I’m aware of what love is. I’m uncertain if I’m capable of feeling it though.**

“I think you love him. Or loved. Whatever. Past tense, present tense, I dunno how hung up you are on him.”

**Quite.**

“Right. So. I dunno if this is any help at all but like… instead of worryin’ about all that, why not look at the obvious?”

**The obvious?**

“He made you. You’re already his imprint of his brain. You said he made you at thirteen right? You got him at his most formative, excited stage and got to see him change into who he was last before the war. Even if he’s gone, it’ll never be forever. Because you’re here.”

Hal was, again, quiet. When Bro blinked next, those bright red eyes focused in on his own from within the shades, so similar to Dave’s and yet by now so different that it was like night and day.

**Thank you, Ambrose. That is quite the food for thought.**

“...Did you just-”

**Don’t get used to it.**

“Sure, Hal.”


	6. Setbacks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Journeys are never without their inherent dangers. When you're living in the wasteland, it's to be expected. Doesn't make them suck any less, though.

** I spy with my little eye-**

“Hal, pick a new game already.”

** I can assure you this is the best game to play out here.**

“Fine,” Bro said, exhausted. They’d been traveling for days on the remains of the highway by now and there was no sign of a proper township. He smelled, his back and legs hurt, and despite having plenty of food water was always a precious commodity. He also had at least four letters to send by now, including a few sketches and schematics he’d designed after toying with the Furby body some more, in case Dave wanted to get his hands on a little guardian bot of his own. The kid was smart, even he’d be able to handle basic scripting to make a functional system for it. Surely someone else he was buddies with could figure out an AI of sorts for it, too. 

True, it would have been easier to follow another path by now, but following the main point of the highway just seemed the best, most direct route for him. Who’s to say it was brahmin who made the trodden paths that led further into the wastes, or humans? What if it was mutants, or worse, deathclaws stalking the wastelands? Scuttling parties of mole rats or vicious dogs.

** Would you like to know what I spy or not, Bro.**

“I don’t want to know, but I’ve got a feelin’ you’re gonna tell me anyway aren’t you.”

** Correct! I’ll give you a few hints.**

Bro groaned in irritation.

“A bloatfly,” he guessed off the bat.

** No, though it is annoying.**

“As annoyin’ as you? Why isn’t there a fuckin’ mute option on these shades..”

** Your second hint is that it’s bipedal.**

That perked him up somewhat. Bro scanned the horizon further off for signs of a city or outpost, a wanderer, a courier. Anyone. Instead what he saw was the lanky, sharply pointed edges of a juvenile deathclaw. A definite pain in the ass, but nothing he couldn’t handle.

“...And how long have we been in deathclaw territory for, Hal?”

** Uncertain, my saved map mentions shopping centers, not deathclaws.**

“Ooh, shopping centers?” he said. “Put a peg in it, if we find somewhere to trade soon we might do a run back to grab some more supplies for trade and keepin’.”

** The deathclaw is still nearby, you know.**

“I can avoid it if I want,” Bro said, taking out his sword. A juvenile would take some fast work, but he knew he was good for dispatching the monstrosities, and people paid good money for their clawed hands, even the small ones. Hell, even he wanted some bits off of one sometime, though mostly for show. How sick would a deathclaw fang necklace be, after all?

** You appear to be approaching the small one instead of fleeing.**

“Watch and learn, Hal,” Bro said as he shifted his weight and began to run. Aching feet or not, his boots cut into the crisp cooked layer of topsoil and sank ever so slightly with each step. The deathclaw noticed him and turned, beginning to awkwardly run towards him, long limbs ungainly but just as deadly as an adult. They met in the middle, Bro’s sword singing off the armored hide of the creature’s forearms, taking a chunk with it as he went. The deathclaw lunged for his middle with a shrill noise, catching a chunk of shirt on the end of one of its spiky hands, but just missing his tender vitals. He turned, and used the momentum to slice at the space where its behorned head connected to its body, the sword sliding against softer skin. Staggered, the small deathclaw stepped forward, then tottered back unsteadily as it began to bleed out.

Bro lifted a foot and kicked the creature backwards to its spiny back, then followed with the sword to spear its chest, cranking the blade to the side once it glanced off a rib, forcing downwards till it stopped moving. Planting his boot on its chest, he yanked his sword free and swung it in the air a few times to rid it of blood, and smirked. Fuck, that felt good. Nothing like taking out a little nightmare to give a nice rush of adrenaline and dopamine. Hell, he wouldn’t even say no to a smoke or a drink right now, ride that high long as he could.

** Excellent, now how do you intend to deal with the mother?**

“Mother?” Bro asked, about a half second before he felt something plow into him like a freight train, sending him flying and pain searing through his right shoulder blade. He landed flat on his face and skidded before rolling over, hand on his sword raising it defensively and other hand reaching for his gun.

Shit. Shit, shit, this was definitely a mother death claw, the hide was darker than usual. He must’ve just killed one of her brood. Not a good look for someone not interested in dying in the middle of nowhere. He fired a quick two shots, missing the first and nailing her in the left eye with the second, though it only seemed to make her more enraged after a brief second of shaking her head. She raised a hand and slashed downwards where Bro was scooting backwards, forcing him to block with a weakened grip before the second slash sang home across his chest, blood spurting where her claws shredded flesh and fabric alike. One of the straps of Bro’s bags was severed, leaving him half dragging it as he continued to try crawling backwards, firing till his clip was empty.

Hal was urgently trying to tell him something, but Bro couldn’t hear anymore, couldn’t think, could only focus on the burning in his chest and the taste of copper in his mouth. Things were flashing through his mind as he stared down the deathclaw, who was raising both of her hands for a double slash that he wouldn’t be able to block in the slightest. Things he still wanted to do, to say. Memories.

Dave the day he left home to travel to the city, bag on his back and barely a look back as he wove past the traps. Dave as a lanky tween, perched by his side on the counter top as he cooked an omelette for them both, telling him a joke that he still didn’t think was funny but that he’d laughed at anyway. Dave at five, sitting on his lap as he fiddled with a new project that would eventually become a birthday present game for him, looking up at him with big red eyes almost full of tears when he refused to tell him what he was working on.

Dave, still struggling to put weight on as an infant as Bro kept him warm on the sofa through a bout of fever, trying to coax him into eating just a bit more from the bottle, wondering if he should make the trek to find a doctor or keep hunkering down and hoping it would work itself out. Being scared out of his fucking mind about this tiny, sick thing in his arms and on his chest, worried he’d break if he moved wrong.

This wasn’t fear he felt. It was acceptance. Dave being sick or hurt was fear, even when he’d been the one to hurt him in the preparations he’d run repeatedly over the years. A deathclaw? This was his just rewards for being cocky without backup. He wanted to have time to apologize to Dave, like he always really meant to.

He wanted to apologize to Hal, too, for not managing to take him to get his body. For getting his hopes up about Dirk and then dying with him in the middle of nowhere. Maybe the shades would get crushed by the deathclaw after he died, spare him much misery. They’d both just go out like a candle in the breeze and nobody would be any the wiser.

A shot rang out, and blood spurted from the side of the deathclaw’s head. She staggered, stomping her sharp feet on his abdomen and legs as she adjusted her balance and snarled in alarm at the new threat. More shots, each one more precise than the last, till finally one hit the same eye he’d shot earlier, and the beast went down on top of him. Though his ears were still ringing, Bro could feel his pulse slowing down and everything going darker as the feeling of faintness took over.

** Bro. Bro!**

“Sorry, Dave,” he mumbled, blood on his lips and eyes unfocusing as red eyes stared at him. No, wait, not Dave. “Hal..”

** AMBROSE.**

The last thing Bro was aware of was a high pitched repeated beeping pattern ringing out from the shades on his face, a signal he knew so well. Anyone out here could recognize SOS when they heard it, but Bro couldn’t care anymore who did hear it.

Darkness claimed him.

  
  
  


\- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

  
  


“...p. See? I think he’s waking up! Jake, push more fluids!”

“I’m going as fast as I can, don’t you think he’d bl-........”

“...ver if we don’t. Sometimes you have to do dangerous things in a time of crisis, just pu-...”

“...rry chap, we’re doing our best. Why were you playing with a deathclaw mot-...”

“...’s going under again, God damn it why don’t we have more gauze!”

“...aid last time we wouldn’t need that many, let me check his ba-...”

“....tting sick, stupid coat, ugh! Hand me a clo-...”

“...ehozaphat he’s rolling in meds and chems! Lookit all this, it’s a kings ran-...”

“...ab whatever you can, inject him with at least two, and hand the alcohol to me so I ca-...”

“...nk he’ll make it? He’s in an awful way, Jade. We’re still at least a few miles out fro-...”

“...re he’ll make it, we just need to hur-...”

** ...ve him. Please. Pulse is falling at an alarming ra-...**

“...re trying our best, believe me, it’s up to him if we ca-...”

** ...n’t lose him to-...**

  
  
  


\- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

  
  
  


When Ambrose woke, it was to clean sheets and a bright light coming from a window. He reached up to touch his face and panicked to realize the shades weren’t on him any longer, looking around as he tried to sit stark upright to look around. Tried being the correct term, considering when he got a few inches upright his abdomen and chest sang with burning pain and forced him to lay back on an aching shoulder. Sighing an exhale, Bro took the room and himself into account.

The room itself looked to be a standard medical setup for a scap town, shelves of supplies and a few more beds shoved into the same room with him, a shabby gray curtain sectioning the space off from another area. He was laying on a cot with the aforementioned clean sheets, which were a hell of a commodity, and wrapped what felt like head to toe in bandages. His chest had padding underneath that seemed fresh enough, as well as his abdomen, and another bandage seemed to be wrapping his shoulder. His forearms had bandages, a shift of his legs revealed smaller areas of wrappings and-

Bro snatched the sheets and lifted them upwards, looking down towards his groin in worry. Okay. Phew. Dick still there and in one piece, no need to panic. Thank fuck.

** Were you honestly more concerned for your dick than me? ** Came a voice from the top of the shelves, arms folded in and tucked at an angle to not get damaged or in the way.

“To be fair, I’ve been attached to my dick longer than you,” Bro said, giving another try at this standing thing and getting as far as sitting upright before he had to stop, dizzy. He was also connected to an IV he realized, two bags half drained already and the tether attached to his arm carefully with another bandage and some tape to keep it from moving. One of the bags was unmistakably blood. “Where’s my stuff.”

** I’m fine, thank you for asking. I can really tell you were concerned for my safety after being nearly disemboweled. I can also tell you’re just dying to know how you went about not dying.**

“My stuff, Hal.”

** In the other room, safe and fucking sound.**

“Thank you. Gimme a second and I’ll come get you,” Bro said, running a hand through his hair. He realized with surprise that it was clean instead of gritty with sand and dust and blood, freshly washed like the rest of him. Someone had taken care to wash him thoroughly it seemed. Hell, even his fingernails were spotless. Shocking. He couldn’t recall the last time he’d been this squeaky clean, it was almost a shame he didn’t remember it. “How long have I been out?”

** Almost a week.**

“Jesus,” Bro rasped as he finally stood up on shaky fawn legs, reaching for the IV stand for balance before making his way over to the shelf, naked as the day he was born save for the bandages. He groped for the shades hurriedly when he started feeling faint again, and had just grabbed them when the curtain pulled back.

A tall girl with dark skin, shocking green eyes and long wild hair tied back into evenly sectioned ponytails stood owl eyed behind large round glasses with a single crack in the left lens, a stethoscope around her neck and familiar leftover military gear covering her from head to toe. She frowned, and immediately rushed forward to grab Bro by the elbow and middle of his back, steering him back to bed.

“How long have you been awake!” she asked. “Why didn’t you wait till someone came to help you? Are you in pain? Do you need any water? Food?”

“Few minutes,” Bro said, more than a little startled. He sat and covered himself soon as he could, but the young woman didn’t back off in the slightest, swooping close to shine a pocket light in his eyes, checking his pupils.

“Has there been any bleeding? Any night terrors? Do you have any numbness or weaknesses?”

“I feel like shit, but otherwise,” Bro said, grimacing and jerking his head back from her grasp as she turned the light off.

“I’ll get Jake to bring some lunch in for you, I’m glad you’re not running on glucose anymore. Actually, I’m glad you’re running at all,” she said with a grin. Her canines were strangely sharp looking. “My name is Jade Harley, and I’m half of the reason you’re alive right now.”

“Is the chap who tried to cuddle the wrong end of a mother deathclaw awake yet?” asked another voice from beyond the open curtain.

“He is! Get some of those mirelurk cakes and mac and cheese, please?”

“I’ll bring some of that slackjaw jerky too, I imagine he’s half starved for real food,” said the male out of sight, before Bro heard distant sounds of dishes and metal scraping metal.

“...So what, you a doctor?” he guessed.

“We both are, in our own right. My cousin, Jake English, is the one who spotted you first out there. The primary reason you’re alive, however, is because we’re both sharpshooters! There wouldn’t have been much left to save if we hadn’t pegged that bitch into the dirt,” she said enthusiastically.

Bro’s lip twitched in amusement. This person couldn’t have been older than her early twenties, but she was a doctor? And a sharpshooter?

“So who really saved me?”

Jade’s smile sharpened somewhat, looking predatory. “I don’t think I’d tease like that when you’re still so weak. All it’d take is a cushion to take you out right now, I bet.”

“Sorry, just. You’re so young…” he trailed off as another figure entered the room with a dinner tray. This person didn’t look much older than Jade if he was a day, face clean shaven and hair styled but messy, standing at about the same height. He looked much more solid, though, shoulders broad and chest straining a little at the fatigues shirt he wore, and his demeanor seemed much sweeter than his cousin at first glance. More innocent somehow, or somehow less aware of the intensity of their surroundings.

“Here you are, I’ll get some juice for you as well in a few ticks. First time I’m seeing this much of your outside as opposed to your inside since we got you scrubbed down!” he laughed, setting the tray on Bro’s lap. The food smelled fresh and was warm on his thighs beneath the sheet, mirelurk cakes looking greasy and delicious, mac and cheese that smelled plenty creamy from the box, and some kind of soft looking jerky rubbed with spices that made his mouth water as much as the fresh stuff before him

“Try to eat slow,” Jade warned him as Jake trotted back out of view for a moment and came back with juice as promised. “Hope apple’s okay! It’s what we’ve got.”

“Apple’s fine,” Bro promised, tucking into the mac and cheese first, eyes closing in bliss. Salty, creamy, rich. He could feel it flooding his system already, a body starved for nutrients beyond the bare minimum of functioning and safety. Once he shoveled a second bite into his mouth, he slid the shades onto his face and grinned a bit when haughty red eyes looked at him. Hal was clearly annoyed, angry even, but those eyes were full of concern too.

“We’ve got tea too, though not everyone enjoys what we brew,” Jake chuckled.

“Their loss, it’s delicious,” said Jade with a shake of her head.

** Scans show temperature readings as normal. Pulse normal. Pupils overly reactive to light, but not abnormal.**

“I hope he didn’t talk your leg off,” Bro said. “He’s kind of annoyin’.”

** You have terminal stupidity, I propose an immediate lobotomy to put you out of my misery.**

“Will you knock it off for ten seconds and let me eat before rippin’ me a new one?”

** It’s true. The doctor said so. You’re just stupid.**

“You  _ were _ snuck up on by a creature twice your size in the wasteland,” Jade pointed out with a smirk. “Though I’m glad Hal’s giving you a positive reading. He was quite useful while we were saving you.”

“How much did he talk,” Bro wondered aloud.

“A bit,” she admitted. “We discussed why you were traveling, though he wasn’t that talkative about details. He let us know about Dave when you kept saying his name, in case you didn’t make it. He wanted us to be sure to let him know, and to send your other letters.”

“You’re a long way from home,” Jake chimed in, taking a seat on the nearest bed to talk while Bro shook his head and went back to eating. “But it’s all fine now. Er.. mostly.”

“How much do I owe you,” Bro said almost immediately, breaking a mirelurk cake in half with his fork before stuffing it into his mouth. He’d worry about manners when he wasn’t sitting in a room with two strangers who’d apparently saved his life and seen him in more detail naked than anyone else had in years.

“We’ll figure out caps in a little bit,” Jade said. “You’re going to need to stay here a while longer either way, and we had to use a lot of your medical supplies.”

“Helped ourselves to a little bit of your food as well, but mostly it was the chems and supplies we needed at the moment. Lucky for us you were damn near carrying a medics inventory on your back!”

“Yeah, I just got through a vault,” Bro said. “Place hadn’t been looted yet till I got there.”

“A vault!” Jake interjected excitedly. “Was it like they say, all sterile and eerily perfect?”

“It was full of the people who used to live there, and they weren’t human anymore,” Bro said simply.

** It was quite a show to see that many feral ghouls get put down in one go.**

“Oh, that doesn’t sound very dapper.”

“Vaults rarely are. They’re either fulla deadly shit, full of a shit load’a nothin’, or fulla people who don’t want you to bother them because you’re all gross from bein’ outside and they know you just want the goodies they’ve got.”

“My grandpa was from a vault,” Jade said with a grin. “He’s the one who raised both of us, taught us everything we know.”

They traded conversation for a time while Bro continued to eat, though it waned when he finished and looked exhausted, surprised that the very act of eating took so much energy out of him. Jake took the tray away and Jade performed a followup examination as Bro settled back tiredly on the pillows. Before she left, he requested his belongings, or what was left of them.

He had an important letter to write.

  
  
  


\- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

  
  
  


Bro’s head ached sickly by the time he finished writing the letter, nearly as much as his heart, and his eyes were wet. He didn’t dare to rub at them, nor to even draaw attention to them, but the fact he’d cried while pouring his fucking soul out onto the page wasn’t something he’d admit to anyone. Hal, bless him, remained quiet aside from occasionally offering a correction on a phrase to make it sound better. At first Bro had resented the dictation, but found the changes in wording to be a positive thing, eliminating double meanings. What he ended up with was the letter he’d envisioned sending Dave when the deathclaw was about to do the killing strike, and the fewer mistakes and misunderstandings that could arise from it was for the better.

It took another few days of resting, eating, and conversing with the doctors before Bro was strong enough to go for walks around the town. First thing was first: he paid express for his letter bundle to be sent to Dave along with some money, the most recently written one marked URGENT in bright red stamped letters. Secondly, he got himself a cola and drank the entire thing in one go. The doctors had been kind enough to spot him some clothes, since his shirt was ruined and his pants were scrapped in the moment by bloodshed and emergency bandage use on top of their general wear and tear. The down side was he hated fatigues… but hey, beggars couldn’t be choosers.

He was settled with another soda at the little bar and grill early one morning, having shared breakfast with Jade and Jake once more (his own recipe this time, which only Jake seemed enthusiastic about once they’d tasted the product), but wanting to just sit outside and enjoy the early morning before the sun really got going on cooking everything in the wasteland to death. Hal was quiet, watching as well he presumed based on the little target viewers moving around every time someone moved.

** What do you plan to do if you don’t get a reply?**

“Keep goin’,” he said with a shrug, taking a sip. “I’m not expecting a reply to any of my letters, but he knows which way we’re headed if he wants to write back. Kid knows how to use a map of settlements to send ahead of the curb if he wants to.”

** ...I was worried I lost you too, back there. But you’ve never once apologized to me yet.**

“Apologized for what?”

** For nearly making me watch someone I care about die. At least the first one had the decency to not die while wearinng me on his fucking face.**

Bro was pensive and stretched his long legs out from his seat before tipping it back on its hind legs, balancing in place as he took another sip.

“I promise I won’t die while wearin’ you, then.”

** You f-**

“I wouldn’t wanna hurt you at all now.”

** … That is acceptable I guess.**


	7. Data

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With a letter received, Bro's long standing questions about Dave finally get an answer, though it may not be the one he hoped for. And when the wasteland is quiet, and an AI is murmuring sweet nothings in your ear, what's a guy to do but respond...?

It was a solid week before Bro left that ramshackle town in the dust, debt repaid as he could get it, and blood spattered boots pointed North. On the off chance that he had mail, he checked in with the next town not far away, and poked his head into the courier station.

“Anything for Strider?”

“Strider?” said a short, gruff looking man as he sized up the long, lean figure ahead of him in the strange sunglasses. ...Eh. He’d seen odder things out here, surely. “Let me check.” A perfunctory glance at the post boxes, and he was heading around the corner to the mail bag, rummaging for bundles.

Bro tapped his fingers on the countertop idly. He didn’t expect anything, really, but it made it easier to pass the uncertainty by at least checking. Anyway, on the off chance he had something, he wasn’t sure what he’d do with it anyway.

“Ah, yes, we’ve got something for a Strider. Ambrose?”

Bro felt his stomach tighten into a steel knot as he saw the thick envelope in the man’s hands, stamped URGENT in bright red letters, and addressed in Dave’s familiar handwriting. He felt light headed, and it took Hal’s eyes flickering in front of his own to make him focus again.

“Er, yes, that’s me. Sorry, was miles away there for a second. I didn’t… I didn’t think anything’d actually be here,” he said, not reaching for the envelope.

“Well, whatever it is, it’s here,” the man said, setting it down on the countertop for him to take. Ambrose stared at it as if it were a bomb before reaching for it, and tucking it into his shirt. 

“Thank you kindly,” he said. For once, he didn’t have a letter to send at this station, having written his peace while healing before. He walked across the small town as if in a daze, taking in the sights and smells both pleasant and unpleasant till he found a run down building with a shop out front selling different locally grown items as well as procured items. Bro could smell the tobacco before he could see the cigarettes, and was already feeling around for caps to secure a few.

**Why are you shopping instead of reading your letter?**

“I’ll get to it,” Bro said, tucking most of the cigarettes away after bumming a light off the shopkeeper. It tasted musty, unpleasant, but it was better than nothing. Not enough, but better than nothing.

**You’ve waited this long for a reply and you’re going to put it off? ** Hal asked, astounded.  **Aren’t you the least bit curious?**

“I’m sober, I’m sore, I’m tired, I’m kinda hungry and my balls itch. Curiosity can wait its turn,” he muttered around his cigarette, more agitated than he could write off with simple annoyance at being pestered.

Truth was, he was terrified of the envelope that was burning a brand against his abdomen, stiff edged and fat with pages. Scared of every inch of paper that lay within. Scared of the still slightly uncertain way Dave wrote his name down compared to his own, as if it were foreign. He smoked till the heat of the smoldering end got too close to his lips, then flicked the entire thing down to the ground and rubbed it out beneath his heel. The last thing anyone needed out here was a fucking fire.

**If you’re putting off reading your letter because you’re needing a drink, I’d recommend having the drink so we can read.**

“Excuse me, did you just say ‘we’?”

**Are you going to remove me when you read your letter? I’m aware already of what your situation is, more or less. I would like to know what he has to say, this Dave of yours.**

Ambrose hesitated slightly, and sighed an exhale out through his nose. 

“When I read it, I’ll leave you on. But keep your goddamn comments to yourself, you hear me? I don’t want an audio chorus goin’ on while I’m tryin’ to do everything.”

**Consider my lips sealed.** Hal was quiet for a moment before he probed once more,  **Are you excited about being closer to the goal?**

Ambrose blinked. “How close are we?”

**Another few days if we do a quick clip. A week if we go slow. Longer if we keep making stops.**

“What about my current pace,” Ambrose asked, knowing he wasn’t as quick as he was pre-injury yet. That would take time. Healing always took time, the bastard. 

**Your current pace is just fine.**

“Besides, should I be askin’ you that question?”

**What question.**

“If you’re excited. I mean, it’s your body we’re headin’ to right?”

**If it is still in one piece, still in place, then yes. I’m quite excited.**

“What’s the first thing you wanna do once you’re in a body?” Ambrose asked, glad to have the conversation change direction from the letter that still pressed against his stomach like a threat. 

**Slap you as hard as I fucking can, for various sundry reasons.**

“Okay, dumb question. What’s the second thing you wanna do once you’re in a body.”

**It would ruin the fun if I told you everything ahead of time** , Hal said coyly.  **Wouldn’t you just like to know?**

“What’s your body gonna look like, anyway? Gonna be all jacked, bigger than me? Big as a mutant? Lift cars over your fuckin’ head?”

**Most likely my body will look like a normal humanoid. The specifics are uncertain to me, I’ve never been inside of it to my knowledge.**

“...If it sucks, there’s always the Furb-”

**I hate that thing, and I hate you.**

Bro smirked. “C’mon. It’s useful and you know it.”

**I’m aware of what you’re doing now. There’s no fooling me. Open your letter, Ambrose. **

The smirk died on his lips, and he ran a hand through his hand, fingers scritching at his scalp, dislodging little bits of dust that clung to the tips from walking the road. He patted his shirt, felt the outline of the envelope… and instead of pulling it out, turned and walked out of town, due North.

**What are you doing?**

“Travelin’, what does it look like?” he asked. “Wanna make good time, so you can go ahead and slap me.”

**Do you mean to put off reading your letter till I can physically force you to open it?**

“Nah, I ain’t gonna wait that long. I just don’t think I could sit still any longer. I’ll read it tonight, once I’m settled down.”

**...It’s not a bomb, you know. It’s just a letter. **

Ambrose rolled his eyes as he walked. “I know. Like I said, I’ll read it tonight.”

Yet, that night came, and he didn’t read it. Nor did he read it in the morning as he ate a cold can of beans, nor as night fell the second night. Instead it remained in his shirt, beneath his folded hands as Ambrose rested by the fire, preparing to go to sleep with Hal perched on his face. It took four days before he finally took it out of his shirt by the firelight and carefully opened it with his pinky finger, ripping the paper as cleanly as possible.

He unfolded the paper and clenched his eyes shut instinctively, unprepared to read what it said.

**...It’s okay** , Hal said.  **Open your eyes and read, Bro.**

“I am, gimme a second. Eyes were dry,” he muttered, blinking exaggeratedly a few more times before glancing over the paper, rubbing the side of his head as he did so. ...Hal was right. It was okay.

While not filled to the brim with excitement at hearing from him, and not dripping with praise or familial love, there was a pleasant rapport contained within. As well as an apology for not writing sooner. Apparently he’d secured a second job where he lived and was saving caps. It was rough work, but he wasn’t just another body there. He had responsibilities, long shifts, and then long periods of having fun and exploring the new neck of the woods he lived in.

Bro was swept into Dave’s world with not just words, but pictures. Within the envelope had been shoved several carefully done drawings, some highly detailed and some cartoony and shittily drawn with his other hand to get the point across and throw a gag or three in. They earned a chuckle, and a smirk. Kid was improving. The last page of the letter said he would be checking for mail like usual, and would be trying to write ahead of the curve as Bro predicted, judging by his path.

...And that was that. No condemnation, but no forgiveness either. No comments on his near death. No questions in return. Bro scanned the pages twice more before setting them down and patting the ground with his fingertips.

**Was it not what you were hoping for? It seemed pleasant to me** , Hal said.  **Your spawn is talented.**

“Mm. Yeah, he is.”

**You didn’t answer the question.**

“I guess I just.. Expected more,” Bro admitted. “I didn’t think I’d get a reply, now I’ve got one. And he didn’t address any of the shit I brought up. Does that mean he’s still pissed at me?”

**People don’t tend to spend money and time and effort mailing people they hate** , pointed out Hal.  **I believe your assumptions are incorrect. An option is that he is still processing everything you said, but didn’t want to remain silent.**

The iron knot in Bro’s stomach finally, blessedly, began to unwind its barbs from within him in relief. That was a theory that was believable. Maybe it was just him being overly hopeful, but he needed that hope right now.

“Maybe.”

**If things were as bad as they seemed, as well, this could be a way of building a relationship with you.**

“Are you programmed to be part therapist? The fuck, a guy gets one letter and suddenly it’s time to play psychologist,” Bro murmured, grunting as he rolled towards his bag and rummaged for paper and pen.

**Writing back already?**

“Yeah. Gonna keep it up, if it’s not gettin’ on his nerves. Won’t write this one as urgent, though. Give it time to get there. After all, should be pickin’ up at the next station after gettin’ your body and heading back.”

**Back?**

“Yeah. Back home.”

**With you?**

“Who else? Got big plans once you get your body aside from knockin’ me into next Tuesday?” Bro asked, pen flicking across the paper as he began to write.

Hal didn’t respond right away. Instead he watched Bro write for a few minutes before speaking again.  **Are you asking me to go home with you?**

“...Well. Yeah, I guess. If you wanna be formal about it.”

**Why.**

Of course he wanted reasons. Bro wet his lips briefly.

“...Becauses I think travelin’ with you is alright, and I imagine it’d be more fun once you’re not sittin’ on my face,” Bro said, slowing his writing to a pause before doodling in the margin, aimless shapes as he thought. “Because I think I’d actually miss you, if you took off once we got that far, after all this shit we’ve already been through.”

**You like me** , Hal stated rather than asked.

“...Yeah. I like you.”

**You wish for me to remain with you.**

“Yeah.”

**...Once I get my body, would you touch it?**

Ambrose blinked. “...Uh. Maybe.” So he knew about that kind of shit, did he? Made sense, to a point.

**Why not yes?**

“It’d depend on what you wanted,” he admitted awkwardly. Was he being propositioned by an AI? That was a new one. “Rule number one of havin’ bodies: you don’t go touchin’ ones that don’t belong to you without permission.”

**Would I have permission to touch you?**

He had to think for a moment. Would he be down for that? With a bot? It’d be weird, considering he didn’t know what kind of body they were going to be working with, but he supposed there was always a possibility for adjustments and customization as needed moving forward. Surely the body hadn’t been designed with that kind of functionality in mind, but…

“Yeah,” he decided. “You’ve got permission to touch me.”

Hal’s eyes flickered into his field of vision again, blinking slowly a few times before fading out. 

**I’m not certain how to touch you, when the time comes. I require data.**

“You propositionin’ me?” Bro asked with a slowly spreading smirk.

**I would prefer to know what to do when I’m able to do so properly** , Hal explained. Then, again,  **I require data.**

“And if I give you data tonight?” Bro asked, pushing his letter away and rolling to his back. “What’s in it for me?”

**A better time when I have my body, since I’ll be able to touch you myself. **

“You never said if I’d be able to touch you back,” Bro pointed out, reaching down to undo his belt buckle. “And mind keepin’ an eye out while we handle this?”

**You will be safe** , promised Hal.  **...And you have permission to touch me.**

“Two dudes touchin’ each other. Sounds gay,” hummed Bro as he flicked his pants open enough to slide a hand in, giving himself a feel and a gentle squeeze to start warming up. “So what kind of data you want, specifically?”

**I want to know how best to touch you** , Hal explained.  **The data I require would be how you enjoy being touched.**

“Wanna be the best at touchin’ be, huh?”

**You could say that.**

Bro moved his hand steadily a few times till he was settled at half mast, then shimmied his pants a little lower, freeing himself to the cool night air. He glanced down, and was amused to see Hal’s eyes flicker into view again, this time not fading away.

“Gimme a second, it’s not quite there.”

**It’s already pleasant to look at.**

“Remind me to teach you some dirty talk, dicks aren’t pleasant to look at,” snorted Bro, continuing to work his fist till he shivered and finally rested at full size against his own palm. “There we go..,”

**I take it you’re giving me the data already?**

“Yep. Take notes. Slow to warm up, but once the motor purrs it’ll go all night,” Bro hummed, closing his eyes. He’d done this thousands of times in his life, but rarely with an audience, and certainly not one in recent memory. Fuck it’d been a while. He remembered to keep his chin down so he’d be in view of the shades properly, letting Hal look to his heart’s content as Bro’s fingers played over his length familiarly.

**Tell me what you would do to me, once you’re able to touch me** , Hal said softly, voice a purr from the shades. Bro smirked a bit, enjoying the sound as he closed his fingers into a fist and began to slowly pump himself. Though he was still a little uncertain of the specifics, it was easy to think of how he’d behave with a human partner. Might as well just proceed that way mentally, and figure out what was different when the real thing was on display.

“Well. Let’s see… Prolly warm you up with a bit of kissin’ first, some hands on explorin’ to see what you had to work with. Then I’d run my hands along your body, make sure you felt every inch of me on your skin,” Bro said with a relaxed sigh. Fuck, this was something he’d needed for a while it seemed. A bit of tlc and privacy. ...Well. somewhat privacy.

**And if I were beneath you?**

“Want me to pin you down, huh?” he asked, fist moving a bit quicker as his mind played out the scenario. “Well. Prolly already warmed you up so you’d be ready for me, by then. Work you open nice and easy till you’re beggin’ for it, bite your neck while I slide on in. Get those thighs nice and far apart for me. Keep on goin’ till I’m good’n deep.”

There was no clarification on Hal’s part about how that might not work, about how he might not be compatible. Instead, there was a soft beeping coming from the shades, like a pulse monitor going off, faster than his own heartbeat.

**And if I were begging for it, by then?**

“I’d let you have it. Mostly,” Bro said, working his fist a bit faster, but not going all the way down. Instead he fisted the top of his length and went about halfway down, squeezing more towards the middle before working back towards the tip. “Probably work you over with about half of what you got a taste of, before goin’ any further. Make you really lose it before hammering ya.”

The pulse beeping sped up again, a constant pace in Bro’s ear, and he adjusted his own hand to go along with it, hissing softly under his breath as he started to work his whole length again.

**And if it were me touching you, like you’re touching yourself right now? If it were my hand instead of yours? Would you find that pleasant?**

“Long as it was warm,” Ambrose chuckled breathlessly, unable to help himself but go quicker. It’d been too long, it felt too nice, and with his imagination running wild there was too much fuel feeding the fire. “You’d need a firm grip, I like that most. More towards the middle than the tip. And nice even strokes…”

**I think I preferred to imagine you inside of me, to the touching** , Hal said suddenly, the firm pulse beeping seeming to mimic Bro’s pulse now that he was letting himself have what he wanted.  **You said before the engine could last all night. Would it do the same with me if I wanted it?**

“Till you were walkin’ funny the next day,” Bro promised, gritting his teeth slightly. It felt too good, it was warm, the voice in his ear was still a purr and his imagination was filling in all kinds of gaps. He just hoped the real deal wasn’t a letdown compared to his lofty imagination.

**Come for me, Ambrose.**

That did it. Bro let out a soft sound and tensed, shielding the tip of his dick with his opposite hand to catch the mess for easier cleanup. The pulse sound slowly settled in his ear before disappearing entirely, leaving him with the sounds of the wasteland in his ear instead. He opened his eyes finally and saw Hal’s blinking at him before they flickered out of sight, leaving him with the night view from behind the shades as usual.

He exhaled another sigh and sat up to clean up.

“I think I needed that. Been feelin’ pent up for a while,” admitted Bro.

**Would you enjoy doing that with me more often?**

“Yeah. Yeah, I’d like doin’ that with you, it was nice.” Bro felt, briefly, like he was finishing a date up. There was no second cleanup, but it did make him wonder… “Is there anything I can do while you’re like this to make you feel nice?”

**Feeling doesn’t really occur in this state. The closest would be electricity, and that could be dangerous for my stability.**

“No electrostim then, got it,” he chuckled. Bro took a glance towards his letter once he was cleaned and tucked away, and shook his head, tucking it back into his bag. He’d work on it tomorrow, the mood was definitely not there right now. Not after that. “But there’s nothin’ you’d like, nothin’ I can do?”

**Just speaking with me is good. I’ve recorded data fo-**

“Recorded? You just mean data-wise, right? Not actual recording, right?”

**Ask me no questions and I will tell you no lies. **

He guessed it was fine, if Hal recorded him jerking off. Not like there was anyone to share it with, and even if there was, he’d be able to write it off as being narcissistic to a point. Record himself to use for getting off later. ...Okay, now the idea was intriguing to him. He’d have to see if Hal would allow him to see video files sometime…

**I’ve recorded data for the future, when I have my body. I would like to use that data once I’m accustomed to the controls.**

“You propositionin’ me again? Want a hot date once you’ve got your own bod?”

**Yes! I want to experience what I’ve learned first hand, and see if all of your talk is as good as it sounds. **

“I can promise I’m not just talk. I can’t promise I’ll be able to do all that to you right away,” Bro warned. “But we’ll see what we’re workin’ with soon enough, I suppose.”

**If I lack genitalia will you make me some?**

Bro was quiet for a minute, just sitting there, trying to think of what in the world he’d gotten himself into. “You want me to make you a dick if you don’t have one.”

**Yes. I want to use what I’ve learned, and that is what I’ve learned with.**

He reached up to rub his eyes beneath the shades, just holding his face for a moment before sighing. In for a penny, in for a pound.

“Right. Uh.. sure. I’ll try to figure out how to do that, if you’re needin’ something. We’ll figure it out.”

**I can’t imagine my body is a tin can, Dirk was working with advanced technology. Surely this will work.**

“Where there’s a will, there’s a way. You’re lucky I ain’t got nothin’ against bots.”

**Robosexual.**

“...Sure.”

They sat in an easy silence for a while, the fire flickering and Bro watching out over the wastes. He felt more relaxed than he had in ages, despite part of his mind now focusing on how to built a robotic dick that had some kind of feedback function. There had to be some kind of research with bots, with ‘droids, that had that kind of functionality. Hell, might even turn into a side business: sex modifications for droids and bots.

That’d make for a hell of a letter to Dave. Actually, so was telling him in general about Hal coming home with him. He could hear the teasing already.

“Hey. Hal.”

**Yes.**

“Do you want me to tell Dave about you comin’ home with me?”

**Of course.**

“Or would you rather write him yourself, once you have your body.”

Hal was quiet for a moment.  **You would entrust me to write to your spawn?**

“Yeah. If you stop calling him my spawn. I think he’d like to get to know you, once you’re not just sittin’ on my face, and I don’t think I can easily mod to Furby to hold a pen.”

**If you even tried, I’d zap you immediately.**

“See, can’t even if I wanted to,” Bro said, lifting his hands upwards and shaking his head, giving a shrug. “My hands are tied by the system.”

**Bro.**

“Yeah?”

**...I’m actually quite excited, to get my body. Not just for the reasons we discussed so far tonight. I’ll finally be able to see what Dirk left for me.**

“...If it’s not there, we’ll figure somethin’ out,” Bro promised. “And if it’s damaged, I’ll do my best to figure out how to fix it.”

**I’ll be able to run diagnostic scans once I’m able to connect, I should be able to tell you how to fix things, or even fix them myself. But Bro, I wanted to ask a favor.**

“Yeah? What, aside from beatin’ my meat, do you want me to do for you?”

**I would like to find other vaults, before we return to your home.**

“Vault huntin’, huh? What for?”

**I need to find other instances of Dirk’s work.**

“You got it. We’ll hunt down whatever scraps of him and his work you need.”

It felt easier to promise than Bro assumed it would. It felt genuinely good.


End file.
